1/1/2016, The two-child policy took effect in China, allowing couples in the
country to have at most two children, replacing the controversial one-child
policy. The change in law was announced by the ruling Communist Party on
October 29 and passed the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress
on December 27, five days prior to its effect.

12/8/2015, A large explosion in
Tianjin, China, destroyed a warehouse containing several hundred tons of hazardous
chemicals. At least 50 died and over 700 injured.

15/12/2014, In Hong Kong police
cleared away the barricades set up in September 2014 by pro-democracy
demonstrators who were demanding free elections without preliminary screening
of the candidates by Beijing. The Chinese President, Xi Jinping, had won against
the Occupy Central movement, but
popular discontent, by young educated students from affluent families remained.

14/3/2011, Fears of a meltdown at
Fukushima nuclear plant, Japan. See Japan earthquake.

24/8/2008, The Beijing Olympics
closed.

8/8/2008, The Beijing Olympics opened. They continued until 24/8/2008.

20/5/2006, The Three Gorges Dam in China
was completed, the world’s largest hydro-electric dam.

4/12/2005, 250,000 people in Hong
Kong protested for democracy.

12/9/2005, The Hong KongDisneyland
resort officially opened.

18/8/2005, Peace Mission 2005, the first joint Chinese-Russian military exercise, began an
8-day programme on the Shandong Peninsula.

1/6/2003, China began filling the Three Gorges Dam, raising the water level by over 100 metres.

24/7/1989, Japan’s Liberal
Democratic Party suffered its first defeat in 30 years, forcing the resignation
of Prime Minister Sosuke Uno. A scandal involving Uno’s former mistress ruined
his career.

22/6/1989, In China, seven students were shot after televised
show trials following the Tiananmen
Square protests.

21/6/1989 The first public
executions of Tiananmen Square demonstrators
began in China.

9/6/1989, In China, the show
trials of the leaders of the Tiananmen
Square demonstration began.

4/6/1989.Massacre in
Tiananmen Square, Beijing, as troops opened fire and brought in tanks. On
early morning Sunday 4th June the army entered the Square. 2,600
were killed and 10,000 injured as soldiers fired on demonstrators, and tanks
drove over them.

14/5/1989, Gorbachev
visited China, the first Soviet leader to do so since the 1960s.

7/3/1989.Chinese troops fired on Tibetan monks and civilians
demanding independence in Lhasa.
Some reports said hundreds died. China annexed Tibet in 1950, and protests for
Tibetan independence had been growing since 1985.

7/1/1989. EmperorHirohito of Japan died, aged 87. He had ruled for more than
62 years. 500,000 people lined the streets for his funeral on 24/2/1989; US
& British war veterans protested that their countries should not honour a
war criminal. Hirohito had opposed war
with the USA in the 1930s, he was also against the Japanese invasion of
Manchuria and Japan’s alliance with Nazi Germany. In 1941 he proposed peace
with Washington, but was persuaded by the War Minister and his generals to hit
Pearl Harbour. He was buried near his father’s mausoleum in the Imperial Palace
Gardens in Japan; his son Akihito, 55, succeeded
him.

12/4/1988.China’s
National People’s Congress voted to allow private enterprise and the transfer
of use of land between private individuals. They did not, however, allow
outright private ownership of land.

10/3/1988, The Chinese Army
occupied Lhasa, the capital of Tibet, after large anti-Chinese demonstrations
by Tibetans.

13/1/1988.Chiang Ching Kuo, President of Taiwan since 1978, died.

13/4/1987, Portugal and China agreed to the return of Macao to
China in 1999.

12/10/1986, Queen
Elizabeth II visited China, the first British monarch to visit the
country.

21/11/1985, Presidents Reagan and Gorbachev ended their meeting
with an agreement to reduce their nuclear arsenals by a mutual 50%.

19/11/1985.Reagan and Gorbachev met in Geneva, the
first such meeting for 6 years.

6/8/1985, In Hiroshima, tens of thousands marked the
40th anniversary of the bombing of the city.

17/3/1985, Expo '85, World's
Fair, opened at Tsukuba, Ibaraki, Japan. It ran until September 16.

19/12/1984. Mrs Thatcher signed an agreement
to return Hong Kong to China in 1997.

26/9/1984, China and the UK signed
an initial agreement to hand Hong Kong back to China in 1997.

1983, China launced the Anti Spiritual Pollution Campaign, with the (initial) approval of Deng Xiaoping.
It was an attempt to roll back economic reform and Western influence.
Individualism and hedonism were condemned, as were academics who promoted
alternatives to Communism.

15/4/1983, The first non-American Disney theme
park opened, near Tokyo.

25/1/1981. The Chinese ‘Gang of Four’ and Mao Tse Tung’s 67 year old
widow were sentenced to death.

26/7/1979, Former Japanese Prime Minister Kakuei Tanaka
was arrested on charges of taking a large bribe from Lockheed.

3/4/1979, China warned the USSR it would not seek to renew the 1950 Treaty of
Friendship when it expired in1980.

17/2/1979, China
launched an invasion of northern Vietnam. China had backed North Vietnam
during the Vietnam war with the US-backed South, but since Hanoi’s victory in
1975, North Vietnam had aligned with the Soviet Union, and in January 1979 North Vietnam invaded Cambodia
and ousted the Pol Pot regime, which China backed.

1/1/1979.Diplomatic
relations were established between China and the USA.

12/8/1978, China and Japan signed a 10-year friendship treaty

22/7/1977. The ‘Gang of Four’ were expelled from the Chinese
Communist Party.

2/7/1977, In China Deng Xiaoping, 73, was restored to power.

11/10/1976. In China the ‘Gang of Four’ were arrested, accused of
plotting a coup.

9/9/1976.Mao Tse Tung,
Chairman of the Chinese Communist party for 40 years, died of a series of
strokes, aged 82.

14/9/1974. China sent two giant pandas, Chia-Chia and
Ching-Ching, to London Zoo.

6/9/1974. At least one
Japanese soldier was reported to be still roaming the forests of the central
Philippines, left behind after World War Two.

29/3/1974, Chinese peasants digging a well unearthed a terracotta army of 8,000 figures and
horses, buried over 2,000 years ago near Xi’an. They belonged to Emperor Qin Shi
Huangdi, who first united China and built the Great Wall. The
artisans who built the tomb were walled up within it, to safeguard its secrets.

10/3/1974, A Japanese soldier was found hiding on Lubang Island in the
Philippines; he believed World War Two was ongoing and was waiting for relief
by his own side.

8/1973,
The Chinese Communist Party launched the ‘Anti-Confucian
Campaign’. The radical supporters of Mao Zedong ostensibly wanted to continue the
suppression of traditional, anti-Communist, ideas, hence the name of the
campaign. In fact it was an attack on the more moderate supporters of Zhou Enlai,
who (just as Confucius
attempted to restore traditional practices such as feudalism) wanted to water
down the Cultural Revolution and
rehabilitate pruged Party officials.

3/3/1972, Beijing, at a UN speech, claimed the territory of Hong Kong.

25/10/1971, China was admitted to the United Nations; Taiwan was expelled from the UN to accommodate this.

5/10/1971, Emperor Hirohito of Japan arrived in Britain on a tour of Europe.He was the first Japanese sovereign to leave Japan for over 2,000 years.He left the UK on 7/10/1971.

13/9/1971, Lin
Paio, 65, Chinese Defence Minister who led an abortive coup against Mao Tse Tung,
died in a plane crash in Mongolia as he attempted to escape.

25/11/1970, The
Japanese novelist Yukio Mishima harangued 1,000 troops on the
disgrace of losing World War Two, then tried to persuade them to form a private
army and launch a military coup. When he realised this was not going to happen,
Mishima
committed seppuku, ritual suicide.

2/3/1969. Soviet and Chinese troops clashed on their border.

13/10/1968, The Chinese
Cultural Revolution ended when President Liu was dismissed from his posts in the Party and the Republic.The Cultural Revolution (see 3/9/1965),
encouraging a return to basic Maoist principles, but also public criticism of
all party members, had been too disruptive
to China’s government and economy.

23/1/1968,The USS Pueblo, an intelligence ship, and its 89 man crew was seized by the
North Koreans in the Sea of Japan.

15/10/1967. Henry Pu Yi, the last emperor of China from the age of 2, died in Peking aged 61.

17/6/1967.China exploded its first hydrogen bomb.This raised tensions between China and the
USSR.

8/1/1967, Rioting in Shanghai,
China, as workers went on strike.

13/8/1966.Chairman Mao of China
announced a 'cultural revolution'. On 18/8/1966 Mao appeared on the
gallery of the Tiananmen Gate in Peking to a crowd of over a million Red
Guards. Then the student Red Guards spread out into China to radicalise the
towns and countryside.

1965, Tibet was officially made an ‘aitonomous region’ of
China.

3/9/1965, The Cultural
Revolution began in China.A reassertion of Maoist principles, it began
with a speech by Marshal Lin
Piao urging pupils in schools and colleges to return to the basics of the Chinese Revolution and to purge liberal and Kruschevian trends in the
Chinese Communist Party.See
13/10/1968.

13/8/1965, Ikeda Hayato, Prime Minister of Japan, died.

1/8/1965, General
Lo Jui-ching, the Chief of Joint Staff of the armed forces of the
People's Republic of China, declared that the Chinese were ready to fight the
United States again, as they had in the Korean War.

22/6/1965, The Treaty on Basic Relations between Japan and the Republic of Korea
was signed in Tokyo, almost twenty years after South Korea had been liberated
from the Japanese Empire.

1964, Japan joined the OECD.

16/10/1964, China exploded a nuclear weapon at Lop Nor.

3/2/1964.China challenged the
USSR for leadership of the Communist world.

27/1/1964. France recognised Communist
China.

9/11/1963, A mining disaster
at Omuta, Japan, killed 442.

1/9/1963, About 100,000
people in two Japanese cities demonstrated against the presence of American
nuclear submarines.

7/1/1957.President Khrushchev of the USSR welcomed China’s Prime Minister Chou En Lai. Behind the scenes, however, there
was rivalry between the two countries. The USSR supported Manchurian and
Vietnamese Communists, and there were differences on how Communism should be
enforced. However Chou En Lai supported the USSR’s crackdown in
1956 in Hungary.

31/12/1956, 90% of Chinese farms had been re-organised into
collectives, with land, implements and animals owned collectively, not privately.

18/12/1956.Japan joined the United Nations.

3/1/1956, The USSR
gave technical aid to China.

8/5/1955.Hiroshima victims arrived in the USA for plastic surgery.

31/3/1955, The Communist Party in China was purged.

16/2/1955, Nearly 100 died in a fire at a home for the
elderly in Yokohama, Japan.

8/3/1954, The US and Japan signed a mutual defence pact.

15/6/1953, Chinese leader Xi Jinping
was born onto a well-connected political family; his father was Xi Zhongxun.

25/10/1952, The USA blocked the entry of China to the United
Nations for the third year running. See 25/10/1971.

5/8/1952, Japan and
China resumed diplomatic relations.

28/4/1952. Japan
regained sovereignty.

26/10/1951, The Chinese news
agency Xinhua announced that the Tibetan
people had been ‘liberated from imperialist aggression and returned to the
great family of the People’s Republic of China’

9/9/1951, Chinese troops occupied the Tibetan capital, Lhasa.

8/9/1951, The San Francisco Treaty of Friendship between the US and Japan was
signed.

25/3/1951, China issued an ultimatum to Tibet, to choose between ‘peaceful liberation’ or
‘military annihilation’. Tibet chose to sign the 17-Point Agreement with China
on 24/5/1951.

25/12/1950.The Dalai Lama fled Tibet in the wake of the Chinese invasion.

13/11/1950, Tibet appealed to the UN for aid against Chinese aggression.

21/10/1950.Chinese forces occupied Tibet.

17/10/1950, Chinese troops
took Chamdo, opening up the way to
central Tibet.

27/2/1950, China and the USSR signed
a joint agreement for exploiting oil in Sinkiang, for joint mining operations,
and joint operation of a civil airline.

14/2/1950.China and the USSR signed a 30-year pact in Moscow.

1/1/1950, Radio Beijing announced that Tibet
was to be ‘liberated’.

8/12/1949, Taipei, Taiwan, was
formally chosen as the capital of Nationalist China. Chiang Kai Shek’sNationalist
Government fled to Taiwan from China to escape the advancing Communists.

20/10/1949,Britain
recognised the People’s Republic of China, under Chairman Mao.

6/10/1949, The USA
granted South Korea US$ 10.2 million for military aid and US$ 110 million for
economic aid for the year 1950.

1/10/1949.The ChineseCommunists
set up a government in Peking, The People’s Republic of China, under Mao. Taiwan
remained independent. Chinese Party Chairman Mao Tse Tung made no secret of the
fact that he considered Tibet part
of China.

2/9/1949, The redistribution of land
became an official part of Chinese Communist policy.

30/7/1949, The HMS Amethyst
successfully sailed 140 miles down the Yangtse
River overnight to escape Chinese Communist forces, see 20/4/1949.

7/1949, Evacuation of Japanese
civilians from the Kuril Islands (Etorofu, Kunashir), and their relocation on
Hokkaido, was now complete.

26/5/1949.Chinese Communists captured Shanghai.

23/5/1949.Chinese Communists drove the Nationalists off the mainland to
Taiwan.

20/4/1949, The HMS Amethyst
was fired upon by Chinese whilst sailing up the Yangtse River with supplies for the British community in
Nanking.She was trapped until the night
of 30/7/1949 when she successfully sailed downriver 140 miles, under fire from
further Chinese forces.

22/1/1949 The Chinese Communists under Mao Tse Tungcaptured Peking. The
Nationalists under Chaing Kai Shek were defeated at Huai Hai
north of Beijing.

21/1/1949, Chiang Kai Shek resigned

15/1/1949.Chinese Communists captured Tientsin.

23/12/1948, Hideki Tojo, Japanese Prime Minister 1941-44, who attacked Pearl Harbour and so provoked
the entry of the USA into the War, was hanged as a war criminal.

14/12/1948, South Korea formed a Department
of National Defence.

29/10/1948, Chinese Communistforces captured the important city of
Mukden, and its arsenal, from Kuomintang
forces.

1/9/1948.The North China People’s Republic was formed by the Communists, underChairman Mao.

7/1947,Evacuation of Japanese families living on the islands of
Etorofu and Kunashir, Japanese territory before World War Two but now occupied
by Soviet troops. Families were given 24 hours notice to pack and leave. They
were taken by ship to Sakhalin, another larger island once divided between
Japan and Russia but now entirely Russian-occupied, then relocated on the
Japanese northernmost island of Hokkaido. Many of these families buried
valuable items in their gardens, expecting to return soon to retrieve them.

12/1946, Russia began relocating
several thousand settlers to the southern portion of Sakhalin, formerly
Japanese territory but now Soviet-occupied.

27/1/1946, In the Far East,
more than 2,000 airmen went on strike at the slow pace of demobilisation.

7/12/1945.The Japanese General
Yamashita was sentenced to death as a war criminal – on the
anniversary of Pearl Harbour – and was hanged the following month.

25/10/1945, Taiwan was formally ceded by Japan to China.

11/10/1945. Fighting broke out in China between the Nationalists under Chiang Kai Shek and the Communists under
Mao Tse Tung.

15/9/1945, Japan was
occupied by Allied forces under General MacArthur.See 28/4/1952, and 14/8/1945.

11/9/1945, Japanese General Hideki
Tojo attempted suicide when American troops arrived at his home to
arrest him as a war criminal. Tojo shot himself below the heart with a
revolver, but survived.

9/9/1945, Japanese forces
in China formally surrendered to Chiank Kai Shek in Nanking.

5/9/1945. Singapore re-occupied by the British. See 15/2/1942.

3/9/1945, General Tomoyuki
Yamashita formally surrendered the
remaining Japanese troops in the Philippines to United States Army General
Jonathan M. Wainwright, the same commander who was compelled to
surrender to Yamashita
at Corregidor in 1942.

2/9/1945, Formal surrender of Japan, see 14/8/1945. The Japanese Chief of Staff,
General Yoshijiro Umezo, signed the surrender document on board the USS
Missouri, in front of General McArthur.

1/9/1945.British troops took control of Hong Kong.

31/8/1945, Douglas MacArthur established the Supreme Allied Command in Tokyo.

30/8/1945, The British Royal Navy returned to Hong Kong.

29/8/1945, The Xinghua Campaign began
in China.

19/8/1945.Soviet troops occupied Harbin and Mukden in Manchuria; 100,000
Japanese there surrendered.

18/8/1945The Soviet invasion of the Kuril Islands began, opening with the
Battle of Shumshu.

16/8/1945, Emperor Hirohito issued a decree at 4:00 p.m. local time ordering
all Japanese forces to cease fire. The Japanese cabinet resigned.

14/8/1945. Japan surrendered
unconditionally. This marked the end
of World War II.VJ day
was officially celebrated on the following day, the 15th August. The
Japanese surrender was officially accepted by General Douglas MacArthur on the
US aircraft carrier Missouri on
2/9/1945. Between
November 1944 and August 1945 nearly 70 japanese cities were pulverised, with
around 300,000, mostly civilians, killed.

For events in North & South Korea after 1945 see Appendix One below

11/8/1945, The US drafted
General Order No.1, providing for Japanese forces in Korea north of the 38th
parallel to surrender to the Soviets; those south of the 38th
parallel to surrender to the Americans. The Soviets began to seal off the North
at the 38th parallel, whilst the US was keen to halt any further
southwards penetration by Russian soldiers.

10/8/1945, Emperor Hirohito
of Japan announced he was prepared to surrender unconditionally. The US
cancelled plans to drop two further atoms bombs, scheduled for 13 and 16 August.

9/8/1945The second atomic bomb was dropped,
on Nagasaki. 40,000 were killed
here.The intended target, Kokura, was obscured
by cloud.

8/8/1945, The USSR, under Stalin,
declared war on Japan. The USSR invaded Japanese-held Manchuria, and northern Korea.

7/8/1945, Radio Tokyo
reported unspecifically about an attack on Hiroshima. The Americans were unable
to immediately assess the results for themselves because of impenetrable cloud
over the detonation site. Late in the day, Imperial Japanese headquarters
referred to a "new type of bomb" used on Hiroshima, admitting that
"only a small number of the new bombs were released, yet they did
substantial damage.

6/8/1945. The first atomic
bomb was dropped, on Hiroshima,
Japan, from the B29 bomber Enola Gay.
At 8.15 in the morning a nuclear chain reaction in the bomb built up a
temperature of several million degrees centigrade. In 0.1 milliseconds a
fireball at 300,000 degrees centigrade was created, and this expanded to 250
yards in diameter one second after detonation. The mushroom cloud reached
23,000 feet into the sky. 78,000 of the city’s population of 300,000 was
killed, some instantaneously, by the blast, some later by the firestorm that
the bomb created, and another 90,000 injured, many seriously.

5/8/1945, The U.S.
Twentieth Air Force flew over twelve Japanese cities and dropped 720,000
pamphlets warning their populations to surrender or face devastation.

4/8/1945, The US dropped
leaflets over Hiroshima, warning that their city was to be obliterated.

3/8/1945, The American
government announced that every Japanese and Korean harbor of consequence had
been mined, leaving Japan totally blockaded.

31/7/1945, On Tinian, the
assembly of the Little
Boy atomic bomb was completed.

29/7/1945, Japan rejected a
US ultimatum to surrender. The US estimated that 1 million Allied casualties
would ensue from a land invasion of Japan.

27/7/1945, On the
Philippine island of Tinian, the Little Boy atomic bomb began being prepared
for use.

25/7/1945, The British 14th
Army captured the railhead of Taunggyi in Shan State, north eastern Burma.

22/6/1945.US troops captured
Okinawa.

3/5/1945,British forces
took Rangoon, Burma.

17/4/1945, The Battle of the Hongorai River began in
New Guinea.

8/4/1945, Cebu City
fell to the Allies.

1/4/1945,The Battle of Okinawa began
as US troops landed on the island. US victory came 83 days later.

20/3/1945.Mandalay was recaptured
from the Japanese.

16/3/1945, Iwo Jima was totally
occupied by US forces; 4,590 US soldiers were killed, out of a force of 30,000
attacking 23,000 Japanese who were heavily dug in with underground bunkers. See
19/2/1945. Iwo Jima, just 750 miles from

Tokyo, could now be used as a base to bomb some 66 Japanese
cities in an attempt to force a Japanese surrender.

9/3/1945, A night
of major firebombing of Tokyo began. Around 100,000 died, mostly the elderly, women
and children; men were away fighting a war that Japan was by then losing badly.

5/3/1945.The British
captured the Japanese base of Meiktilla in Burma, cutting Japanese-occupied
Burma in two.

2/3/1945The British 14th army
entered Mandalay, Burma.

19/2/1945, US forces began the invasion of Iwo Jima, see 16/3/1945.

16/2/1945.(1)US Air Force began heavy raids on Tokyo.

(2)The US took Bataan, Philippines.

3/2/1945.The US recaptured Manila, which
had fallen to the Japanese on 2/1/1942. Manila was not totally cleared of
Japanese soldiers till 24/2/1945.

9/1/1945. Luzon in the
Philippines was taken by the US from the Japanese.

4/1/1945, Severe
Kamikaze attacks on US ships.

25/11/1944, The first
Kamikaze (divine wind) suicidal attacks were made by Japanese pilots on US
ships.

24/11/1944. US planes
bombed Tokyo, for the first time
since 18/4/1942.

19/11/1944, The Shinano, the largest Japanese aircraft
carrier ever built, was formally commissioned. Thought capable of withstanding
any bomb, she was sunk ten days later by the US submarine Archerfish, with four
torpedo hits, with the loss of 1,435 lives. A further 1,000 sailors were
rescued.

11/11/1944, Iwo Jima was bombarded by the U.S. Navy.

27/10/1944, The Japanese
fleet suffered a crushing defeat in the Battle
of Leyte Gulf, effectively ending its role as a fighting force.This was the world’s largest naval battle,
which began on 22/10/1944, involving a total of 231 ships and 1996 aircraft.

25/10/1944, US escort
carrier St Lo became the first ship sunk by a Japanese kamikaze attack.

20/10/1944.General Mac
Arthur returned to the Philippines with 250,000 troops, fulfilling a
promise ha made when his forces retreated from the Japanese.

1/8/1944.US forces captured
the Pacific island of Tinian from the Japanese. Tinian was then developed as a US air force base, from which the
mission to drop atom bombs on Japan was to
depart (see 6/8/1945).

18/7/1944.Prime Minister Tojo of Japan resigned.

4/7/1944, Conclusion
of the Battle of Kohima-Imphal. Crucial battle of the Burma campaign; the 14th
Army under Slim
fought the Japanese in Burma from 4/3/1944. Allied troops were supplied by air
and held back the Japanese from the key towns of Kohima and Imphal.

19/6/1944,The USA took
Saipan.It took over three weeks to
defeat the Japanese, at a cost of 3,000 Americans dead and 17,000 wounded;
27,000 Japanese also died.The US did
not attempt to capture all Pacific islands in their path to Japan, only
selected ones, leaving other heavily-armed islands to ‘wither on the
vine’.The Japanese fought fiercely and
had no fear of death; many ‘Banzai’-charged the US soldiers, led by officers
wielding swords.

15/6/1944. Air raids on
Japan hit steel mills at Yawata.

7/3/1944, Japan launched an
offensive from Burma into India.

21/2/1944. Hideki Tojo became Chief of Staff of the Japanese Army.

4/2/1944.US warships
shelled the Japanese homeland; the island of Paramishu.

1/12/1943, The Cairo
Declaration, issued by the USA, UK, and China, pledged independence for Korea
‘in due course’. The provisional Korean government in exile, in Chungking,
south west China, asked for clarification of this vague phrase, but received
none.

1/11/1943,US forces retook Bougainville, in the Solomon Islands.

13/9/1943. General Chiang Kai Shek was elected President of the Chinese Republic.

29/6/1943, US forces landed
in New Guinea.

4/3/1943, The Battle of the Bismarck Seaended (began 2/3/1943). A Japanese
convoy carrying troops to Papua New Guinea was sunk by Allied forces.

7/2/1943, The Japanese
completed their withdrawal from Guadalcanal.

2/2/1943.Japan made a
last-ditch effort to recapture the Solomon
Islands.

14/1/1943.The Japanese began withdrawing from
Guadalcanal.

19/12/1942. British troops
advanced in the Malay peninsula, pushing the Japanese back into Burma.

15/11/1942, The naval battle of Guadalcanal ended
in US victory. On the battle's
final day the Japanese battlecruiser Kirishima and destroyer Ayanami were sunk
by the American battleship USS Washington, while the Americans lost the
destroyers Benham and Walke.

12/11/1942, The naval battle
of Guadalcanal began.

27/9/1942.Japanese forces pulled back in New
Guinea as the allies advanced.

7/8/1942. The USA attempted
a landing on the Japanese-occupied southern Solomon Islands. US troops invaded Guadalcanal.

8/6/1942. The Japanese
shelled the Australian cities of Newcastle
and Sydney.

8/5/1942. The Battle of
the Coral Sea. The Japanese and the US each lost an aircraft carrier(US carrier, the Lexington), and the Japanese turned back from an invasion of Port
Moresby, New Guinea. This was the first Allied success in the
Pacific, and saved Australia from a
Japanese invasion.

7/5/1942,Madagascar was
occupied by British troops to forestall any Japanese invasion.

25/4/1942, American troops
arrived in New Caledonia to assist in defence of the archipelago.

17/4/1942, Japanese forces
in Burma reached Yenangyaung. The main
oilfields in Burma were destroyed to prevent them from falling into Japanese
hands.

9/4/1942.The Japanese
captured Bataan

12/3/1942, US troops occupied New Caledonia.

10/3/1942.Rangoon, Burma, fell to the Japanese.

9/3/1942, The Dutch East Indies campaign ended in decisive Japanese victory. The
Japanese occupation of the Dutch East Indies began.

8/3/1942.Java surrendered to the Japanese.

7/3/1942. British forces withdrew from Rangoon.
Bandung, Java, also fell to the Japanese, effectively giving all of Java to Japan.

2/3/1942, The Japanese began heavy air strikes on New Guinea in preparation for an invasion.

28/2/1942.TheJapanese landed on Java, Indonesia.

27/2/1942, The Battle of the
Java Sea, in which the Dutch navy was
destroyed in defence of Australia. The Japanese were now able to occupy
Java.

22/2/1942.Civilians were
evacuated from Rangoon as fighting
raged 80 miles north east of the city.

20/2/1942, Bali, east of
Java, was invaded by Japan.

19/2/1942.TheJapanese
bombed the Australian city of Darwin.

15/2/1942. Singapore occupied by the Japanese. See 5/9/1945. The base was supposed to be
impregnable, but all its guns pointed out to sea; the Japanese came overland.
The base was running out of water and surrendered, but the British did not know
the Japanese were almost out of ammunition. The Japanese now had a massive
arsenal of guns and ammunition.

12/2/1942.The Japanese
captured Bandjermasin, the main town on the south coast of Borneo.

31/1/1942.The Japanese laid
siege to Singapore. They landed on
Singapore on 9/2/1942.

19/1/1942.Japanese
invaded Burma.

18/1/1942, Japanese forces
captured Tavoy, Burma.

16/1/1942, In the Battle of
Muar in Malaya, the Japanese 5th Infantry Division crossed the Muar River and
captured Muar itself.

14/1/1942, The Battle of
Gemas was fought in Malaya, resulting in tactical Australian victory.

11/1/1942.Kuala Lumpur,
Malaysia, was captured by the Japanese.The Japanese also landed on the northern tip
of the Celebes this day, and within a month controlled all the island
except the remote interior.

10/1/1942.The Japanese
invaded the Dutch East Indies.

2/1/1942. Manila captured by the Japanese. The US recaptured it on
3/2/1945.

1/1/1942, The British
withdrew from Sarawak.

25/12/1941.Hong Kong surrendered to the Japanese. 6,000 troops laid down arms after a 7-day battle.

22/12/1941, General Wavell met with Chiang Kai Shek at Chonqquing.

21/12/1941, Siam
(Thailand) signed a treaty with Japan permitting the entry and transit of
Japanese troops. This facilitated the Japanese invasion of Burma.

18/12/1941, British
and Dutch forces occupied East Timor. Malaya was evacuated and the Japanese
attacked Hong Kong.

17/12/1941.Sarawak, Borneo, was invaded by the Japanese.

14/12/1941, Japan and Siam
(Thailand) signed a ten-year co-operation treaty.

13/12/1941, The Japanese
controlled the mainland area of Hong
Kong, and Kowloon; Hong Kong
Island was still British-held.

10/12/1941.Japanese forces
off Malaya sank two major British naval vessels, the Repulse and Prince
of Wales, thereby eliminating
British naval power from the Far East for some time. Also on this day the
Japanese occupied Aparri, a major port in northern Luzon, Philippines. US forces
retook it in June 1945. Japan invaded Malaya.

9/12/1941, US air force
bombed Luzon, Philippines.

See also France-Germany, from 1/1/1870, for European events
of World War Two

8/12/1941.Britain and the USA declared war on Japan. Costa Rica, El Salvador, Haiti, and the Dominican
Republic also declared war on Japan, and China declared war on all the Axis
powers. Britain declared war on Finland, Rumania, and Hungary.Siam (Thailand) agreed to the passage of
Japanese forces through its territory to attack British Malaya.

7/12/1941. Japanese attack on the USA fleet inPearl
Harbour, Hawaii. Pearl Harbour
was taken entirely by surprise and within 2 hours 360 Japanese warplanes had
destroyed 5 battleships, 14 smaller craft, and 200 aircraft. 2,400 people, many
of them civilians, were killed. However the Japanese failed to find and destroy
America’s all-important aircraft carriers, both of which were away on
manoeuvres. The Japanese force then turned west to strike the British in the
East Indies, Australia, and Ceylon (Sri Lanka). The US Congress met to declare war in emergency session on 8/12/1941,

much to the relief of Britain.
Hitler, meanwhile, was pleased because he imagined that this would distract the
US away from the War in Europe.

18/10/1941, The
expiry of a 6-week deadline, set by the Japanese military on 6/9/1941, for the
completion of negotiations with the USA. By the end of September 1941 Japanese
oil reserves had fallen to 15 million barrels, and the military wanted to go to
war in SE Asia to secure more oil. However there were concerns in Japan about
the reaction of America to this invasion. The President of the Japanese
National Planning Board stated that domestic oil production could be increased
for a fraction of the cost of a war. The pacifist Prince Konoye also opposed war.
But when the 18 October deadline passed without result, Konoye resigned and General Tojo
became Minister of War. Tojo was less militant than many of his
colleagues and extended the deadline for a result of the Japan-US negotiations
for a further 6 weeks, to 25 November; again no agreement was achieved.

17/10/1941.General Tojo appointed Prime Minister of Japan.

1/8/1941, The US imposed an
embargo on oil sales to Japan.

29/7/1941, The Vichy French
Government gave Japanese forces use of the air bases in Indo China.

27/7/1941.Japanese troops moved into Cambodia and Thailand,
and captured Saigon.

24/7/1941, Japan
announced that Vichy France had consented to Japanese ‘protection’ of the
French colonies in Indo-China.

2/7/1941, Japan
called up over one million conscripts, and pulled its merchant ships out of the
Atlantic.

5/6/1941, Heavy
Japanese air raid on Chonqquing, where the Chinese Nationalists had moved their
capital to in 1937 when the Japanese invaded China. Many died of suffocation as
the underground tunnels they were sheltering in collapsed.

13/4/1941. Stalin signed a
neutrality pact with Japan; Russia
was concerned that Japanese conquests in Manchuria had brought Japanese forces
up to Russian territory. Whilst this
meant that Russian troops from Siberia could be used to resist the German
threat, it also freed Japanese troops
for action against China

7/11/1940.Britain, the USA, and Australia agreed on the
defence of the Pacific.

27/9/1940. Imperial Japan
signed a 10-year military and economic alliance with Nazi Germany and Fascist
Italy. This was greatly disturbing
to both the USSR and the USA; Japan and Russia had been enemies since the 1905
war, and Hitler’s alliance with Russia, signed in 1939,was looking more uncertain.. The USA now realised that entering the war
on the side of the Allies would now entail a war in the Pacific.

22/9/1940.Japanese forces entered Indo-China.

26/7/1940, US President Roosevelt imposed
sanctions on Japan in retaliation for Japanese air raids on US missions and
churches in China.

22/2/1940, The 5-year-old Tenzin Gyatso
was enthroned as the 14th Dalai Lama in Tibet. Gyatso was born on 6/6/1935, the
day the 13th Dalai Lama died, and was beloved to be his
reincarnation, in a sequence going back 544
years. Lhasa’s wise men located Gyatso in 1938 and in traditional manner
Gyatso had to pick out various objects that had belonged to his predecessor
from amongst a collection of similar objects; he picked them without hesitation.

4/1/1939.The fascistBaron Hiranuma became Prime
Minister of Japan.

21/10/1938.The Japanese occupied Canton.

12/10/1938, Japanese troops landed in force on the Chinese mainland, and advanced swiftly on Canton.

27/9/1938. The League of Nations denounced Japanese
aggression in China.

11//7/1938.Soviet and Japanese troops clashed on the Manchukuo border.

6/3/1938, The
Japanese advanced along the Hangchow Railway through Shansi Province towards
the Yellow River.

24/12/1937.Japanese troops
captured Hankow, China.

22/12/1937, Britain protested
to Japan about attacks on Royal Navy ships on the Yangtse River.

12/12/1937, Japan captured Nanjing, China, see 7/12/1937. They massacred over
100,000 of the city’s population.

29/9/1937.In the face of a
full-scale Japanese invasion of China, Chiang Kai Shek, the Chinese leader, came to an
agreement with his Communist rival, Mao Zedong.

28/9/1937.The League of
Nations condemned the Japanese invasion of China.

25/9/1937.The Japanese
bombed the Chinese Nationalist capital of Nanjing.

14/8/1937. Hundreds were killed in a Chinese air raid on
Shanghai.1,000 died as Chinese aircraft, intending to
bomb Japanese warships in the harbour, in
fact bombed the International Concession; their bombs fell short of the
target.Many Chinese refugees were
killed, and foreign powers made urgent plans to evacuate their nationals as Japanese land forces closed in.

29/7/1937.Japanese troops
took Beijing, see 7/7/1937.

10/7/1937, In China, Chiang Kai-shek
made a radio address to millions announcing the Kuomintang's policy of
resistance against Japan.

9/7/1937, Japan,
just two days after the outbreak of war with China, introduced a system of
universal healthcare, to supplement the existing scheme which covered
industrial employees only. Between end-1938 amd end-1944 the number of citizens
covered by this universal health insurance rose from 500,000 to 40 million. The
aim was to ensure a healthy population, ready to fight in war.

7/7/1937.The Marco Polo Bridge Incident. Japanese soldiers were exercising near the Marco
Polo Bridge, south-west of Beijing, under the Boxer Protocol of 1901 which
permitted foreign troops to be stationed in the Beijing area. However they were
attacked by Chinese forces. A ceasefire was arranged on 11/7/1937, however the
Japanese Foreign Minister, Konoe, nevertheless announced plans to mobilise five
divisions in northern China. In response Chiang Kai Shek, reversing his
previous appeasement policy which he had followed in response to Japan’s
efforts to remove northern China from Chinese control, now reinforced Chinese
forces. Japanese forces then took control of Beijing, on 29/7/1937, starting
the 1937-45 War.

25/11/1936.Germany and Japan
agreed to protect world civilization from the Bolshevik menace, and signed the Anti-Comintern Pact, organised by Ribbentrop.Germany
recognised the Japanese puppet state in Manchuria.See 6/11/1937.

11/8/1936, Chiang Kai Shek entered Canton, China.

20/10/1935.Mao Zedong’stroops completed their ‘Long March’ and arrived in the
comparative safety of Yan’an in remote north-west China (Shenxi province). Of
the 100,000 that set out from Kiangsi province 364 days and 6,000 miles
earlier, only 10,000 battered and emaciated survivors remained. They had fought
all the way, broken through ten encircling armies, crossed 11 provinces and 24
rivers.The Communists could now regroup to
fight Chinese Nationalists
and the Japanese occupiers.

16/10/1934.Mao Tse Tung's'Long March'
began.See 20/10/1935.

15/6/1933, China and Tibet
ended a two-year war, agreeing to settle upon their pre-war border.

25/2/1933. Japan withdrew from the League of Nations in protest at avote condemning the Japanese invasion of Manchuria. Japan now occupied all of China north of the Great Wall.

25/7/1932. The USSR, Poland, and Japan
signed a non-aggression pact.

17/7/1932, In China Chiang Kai Shek began an anti-Communist
drive.

15/5/1932, The
Japanese Prime Minister, Ki Tauyoshi Inukai, was assassinated. He was
succeeded by the Governor-general of Korea, 73-year old Makoto Saito.

5/5/1932.Japanese troops
withdrew from Shanghai after an armistice was agreed.

9/3/1932. The last emperor of China, Pu Yi,
was installed as head of the Japanese puppet government in Manchuria.

28/1/1932.The Japanese occupied Shanghai, start
of a full scale invasion of China.
Ostensibly in revenge for a Chinese boycott of Japanese goods, the Japanese
were aware of possible US attacks in defence of China. They warned the US that
any attempt to interfere in their operations in China would result in war.

8/1/1932.An assassination attempt was made on the Japanese Emperor Hirohito.

2/1/1932.The Japanese proclaimed the Republic of Manchukuo in Manchuria.

24/9/1931, The Japanese set up
a puppet government of Manchuria based in Mukden.

21/9/1931, The Japanese took Kirin, China. By early 1932 they controlled three
coastal provinces.

18/9/1931.Japan besieged Mukden as it invaded
Manchuria.The Japanese set up a puppet state called Manchukuo, which was returned to China
in 1945 after World War Two.The
Kwantung (Japanese) Army had started the incident, by blowing up wagons on the
South Manchuria railway, near the Chinese garrison at Mukden, then blaming the
Chinese.However the plot was supported
by military leaders in Tokyo.See
18/2/1931.

3/8/1931, Heavy
rainfall along the Yangtze River burst a dam which flooded 104,000 square
kilometres of farmland. Widespread famine followed. The 37-year old leader of
China, Mao
Tse Tung, faced multiple threats from this and the Communist
rebellion, undermining
his ability to deal with the Japanese invasion.

25/12/1926.Emperor Hirohito ascended the Japanese throne after the death of his father Emperor Yoshihito.He died in January 1989 after 62 years as
Emperor.

6/9/1926, In China, Chiang Kai Shek captured Hankow.

1/1/1926, The Nationalist government was established in China.

30/11/1925, The US sent warships to Hankow, China, to stop attacks by Communist
Chinese on foreigners.

7/9/1925.Anti-British
rioters were shot in Shanghai. Protests had begun in May over working
conditions in Japanese owned factories in Shanghai, and British police shot and
killed demonstrating workers on 30/5/1925.

29/3/1925.Japan passed a
Bill for universal male suffrage.

22/3/1925, Radio broadcasting began in Japan.

19/3/1925. Britain established a large naval base at Singapore. This reinforced links with
the British colonies such as Hong Kong, but
Japan saw it as a threat.

5/11/1924, The last
Manchu Emperor, Pu-Yi, 18, was evicted from his palace in
Beijing by the Christian warlordFeng
Xuyiang who took control of the city. Pu-Yi had been compelled to abdicate in 1912, when he was aged 6,
by the Revolutionary Government in Nanking after the Wuchang uprising, ending
268 years of Manchu rule and over 2000 years of imperial tradition. He was
allowed to continue living in his palace in the Forbidden City, and was temporarily restored to the throne by
General Xun’s coup in 1917, but was dethroned after 12 days. Pu-Yi now sought
refuge in the Japanese concession at Tien-Tsin.

3/11/1924, Feng Yuxiang's
troops entered Tianjin.

31/5/1924.China
recognised the USSR.

15/4/1924, The Japan Times
called for a boycott of California if the United States passed the Immigration
Act, putting the blame for the Bill on that State.

21/1/1924 The Chinese Kuomintang Congress admitted the Communists.

27/12/1923, Emperor Hirohito of Japan narrowly escaped assassination.

17/8/1923. The defence
treaty between Japan and the UK (see 30/1/1902 and 23/8/1914) was replaced by a
four power agreement between the USA, France, Japan, and the UK.

1/2/1922, Death of
the Japanese statesman Yamagata Aritomo (born 14/6/1838). He played a
key role in the rise of Japan as a military power in the early 20th
century. He was Chief of Staff during the Russo-Japanese war of 1904-05.
Because of this War he developed the ‘Plan of National Defence’ in case of
another war with either Russia or America. This Plan formed the basis of
Japan’s entry into World War Two. Yamagata died in disgrace after
public censure for meddling in the Crown Prince’s marriage.

25/11/1921.Hirohito became Regent in Japan.

23/7/1921. The first congress of the Chinese Communist Party
was held in Beijing.

10/4/1921, Sun Yat Sen was elected President of China.

15/12/1920. China and Austria were admitted to the League of
Nations.

15/9/1919. China ended its war with Germany.

25/7/1919, The Soviet Assistant Foreign Commissar, Leo Karakhan,
issued the Karakhan Manifesto. This renounced all former Tsarist rights and
privileges in China. Although Russia did not hand over the Chinese eastern
Railway (it in fact sold it to the Japanese in 1935), this Manifesto did much
to convince the Chinese
radicals that Soviet Russiawas their only ally.

4/5/1919. News that the Treaty of Versailles been signed
reached China. However, despite the fact that China had declared war on Germany
in August 1917, and had over 200,000 soldiers to fight with the Allies, the
Treaty stated that German concessions in China would not be returned to the
Chinese but would be given to Japan. There were large anti-foreigner demonstrations in China.
Over 3,000 students gathered in Tiananmen Square, Beijing, to protest at
Japan’s continued occupation of Shantung after World War One had ended.

1/3/1919, Anti Japanese colonialism demonstrations in
Seoul, Korea.

2/8/1918. British, French, and US forces landed at Archangel to support White Russians
against the Bolsheviks. Japan invaded Siberia.

6/4/1918. US, British, and Japanese
troops landed at Vladivostock.

15/9/1917.China offered the
Allies 15,000 troops to fight on the Western Front.

14/8/1917.China declared war
on Germany and Austria.

14/3/1917, China broke off
diplomatic relations with Germany.

6/7/1916. Russia and Japan signed a peace treaty.

18/1/1915.Japan made ’21 Demands’ on China, which if accepted would virtually
give Japan sovereignty over China.

29/11/1914, Japanese forces
seized German territory at Kiaochow, China, thereby winning favour with the
Allies.However Japan then went on to try and
establish a virtual protectorate over most of China.

7/11/1914. The German fortified city of Qingdao
(Tsingtao)in China surrendered to the
Japanese.

2/9/1914.The Japanese began
landing forces at Lungkow, 150 miles north of Tsingtao.

27/8/1914, Japanese
forces began a blockade of Kiaochow Bay, China, to force the surrender of the German stronghold of the town of Tsingtao
there.

23/8/1914. Japan declared
war on Germany. This was due to the
treaty of mutual defence concluded between Japan and the UK on 30/1/1902. The
Germans had not responded to an ultimatum by Japan issued 14/8/1914.See 17/8/1923.

10/8/1912, The Republic of China's provisional government
enacted its election law, creating a
lower house of Parliament, and limiting voting rights to male citizens aged
over 21, had two years residency in their district, and met property and
educational restrictions.

7/8/1912.Japan and Russia reached agreement on their spheres of influence in
Mongolia and Manchuria.

2/8/1912, Tibetans were routed by Chinese
soldiers at Lhasa.

30/7/1912, In Japan, Meiji Emperor Mutsuhito died aged 60, after a
45-year reign during which Imperial power was restored to Japan (the Meiji Restoration). He was succeeded by
his son, Yoshihito,
aged 33, who reigned until 1926.

14/4/1912, China's President Yuan Shih-kai
issued a manifesto asking the five separate race groups in the nation to unite
through intermarriage.

4/4/1912.A Chinese Republic
was declared in Tibet.

2/3/1912, As rioting broke out in response to the fall of
the Manchu Dynasty in China, Beijing was placed under martial law. Foreign
troops arrived the next day to protect the citizens of their respective
nations.

29/2/1912, Military revolt in Beijing.

12/2/1912, The Chinese Manchu dynasty came to an end when the
weeping Empress,
Dowager Longyu, read out an edict of abdication on behalf of the
5-year-old Chinese
boy-Emperor, Pu-Yi. However the Imperial family were allowed to
continue to live in the Forbidden City, with a stipend of US$ 4million a year.

1/1/1912.The Republic of
China was officially proclaimed.

29/12/1911, Chinese revolutionary Dr Sun Yat Sen (1866-1925) became
the first President of the Republic of
China.

6/12/1911.Russia announced that Mongolia was a Russian
protectorate.

2/12/1911, Chinese Republicans captured Nanking.

30/10/1911, Guided by the Regent, Prince Chun, the Emperor Pu Yi
granted China a constitution. This was to combat growing support for the rebel Republican army ofSun Yat Sen.

10/10/1911, The Imperial Manchu Dynasty,
which had ruled China since 1644, was forced to abdicate ‘voluntarily’ and a Kuomintang Republic was proclaimed at Wuchang,
under Sun Yat-Sen.

5/1911, The
Imperial Dynasty of China was brought down – by a decision to nationalise the
railways. This was disliked by the local gentry, who owned the railways. It was
also distasteful to the Nationalists because a
US$ 6 million foreign loan had bene taken out to finance this nationalisation.

22/8/1910.Japan formally
annexed Korea.

4/7/1910.Russia
recognised Japanese occupation of Korea
in return for a free hand in Manchuria.

26/10/1909, Ahn Jung-geun, a Korean nationalist and
independence activist, shot dead Hirobumi Ito, the Japanese colonial governor of Korea, on a station platform at
Harbin.

2/12/1908.In China, the child
emperor Pu Yi succeeded to the throne, aged 2. His father, the Regent Prince
Chun, held the real power.Pu
Yi was forced to abdicate in 1912 aged 5 as Republican forces gained strength
in China.

15/11/1908.Death of the Chinese
Empress Dowager Cixi, at 37 years of age. Her suspicious demise (she
was not unhealthy) greatly reduced the chances of a smooth transition to a
constitutional monarchy in China.

20/2/1908, The Russian General Stossel was sentenced to death for surrendering to the Japanese.

25/7/1907. Japan made Korea a protectorate. The
Korean Emperor Kojong
(I T’ae Wang) who had ruled since 1864 abdicated 19/7/1907, aged 55
under pressure from Japan, who was occupying Korea.

19/7/1907, Kojong,
Emperor of Korea for 43 years, aged 55, abdicated under pressure from the
Japanese, who were occupying his country.

15/4/1907.Japan handed Manchuria back to China
under the Treaty of Portsmouth, which ended the Russo-Japanese war.

5/12/1906, Russian Admiral Niebogatov went on trial, accused of surrendering ships to the
Japanese.

15/11/1906, Japan
launched what was then the world’s
largest battleship, the Satsuma.

27/4/1906.China reluctantly granted Britain
control of Tibet, following the
occupation of the capital Lhasa by British troops.

7/2/1906.Pu Yi, last Emperor of China, was born in Beijing.

3/2/1906.Japan decided to double the size of its navy by 1908.

5/9/1905.The Treaty of Portsmouth (New Hampshire) was signed, ending the Russo-Japanese war.
Japan acquired south Sakhalin from Russia, also the Russian leasehold
territories in South Manchuria. Russia
also recognised Japanese dominance in Korea, which led to Japan formally
annexing Korea as a colony in 1910. Russia refused to pay any indemnities,
sparking angry demonstrations in Tokyo. This Treaty marked the start of
Japanese expansion into China, which aroused unease in Washington.

29/8/1905.Russia and Japan
agreed peace. An armistice was arranged for 31/8/1905. A peace
treaty was signed between Russia and Japan on 5/9/1905 at Portsmouth, New
Hampshire, USA.

31/7/1905. The Russian governor of Sakhalin Island surrendered to the
Japanese.

27/5/1905.The Russian fleet was annihilated by the Japanese
at the Battle of Tsushima. Tsar Nicholas II had sent a fleet of 38
ships on an 18-month voyage from the Baltic to the Far East, including 7 battleships
and 6 cruisers. This was met in the Tsushima Straits by Admiral Togo who
commanded a fleet of similar size. Battle began on the afternoon of the 27 May
and recommenced at dawn on the 28th. All but 3 of the 38 Russian
ships were sunk or captured; Japanese losses were just 3 torpedo boats. The
Russian fleet was too late to save Port Arthur in any case, which had
surrendered to Japan on 2/1/1905. Along with the hunliating defeat at Mukden
(10/3/1905) the Tsar now had to accept a humiliating treaty allowing extensive Japanese territorial gains in northern China.
The rest of the world now had to accept Japan as a major power, although until
1854 Japan had been a feudal state closed to the rest of the world.

30/3/1905, President
Roosevelt was asked
to mediate in the Far East war between Japan
and Russia.

10/3/1905.The Japanese defeated the 200,000 strong Russian
army at Mukden.

19/2/1905, The Japanese began
fighting the Russians for control of Mukden.

13/2/1905.The Japanese laid siege to Vladivostock.

1/1/1905.Russians defending
Port Arthur finally capitulated to the Japanese; the effort had cost the lives
of 60,000 Japanese troops.

5/12/1904.The Japanese destroyed the Russian fleet at Port
Arthur.

30/11/1904, The Japanese made
headway against the Russians at Port Arthur, at the cost of 12,000 casualties.

2/8/1904, The British had faced resistance by Tibetans against colonial expansion.On
this day the British, successful against Tibet, entered Lhasa. See
7/9/1904. Britain was concerned about growing Russian influence over Tibet.
In May 1904 the last serious Tibetan resistance, in the Karo Pass, had been
overcome. 3,000 Tibetans had taken up position behind a wall connecting two
forts fired on advancing British, Sikh and Ghurkha forces. However the Sikhs
outflanked the Tibetans whilst the Ghurkhas climbed a precipice to fire down on
them. The Tibetans fled, leaving 400 dead.

26/6/1904.Japanese forces inflicted a heavy defeat on the
Russians at Telissu.

25/5/1904.In a major battle of the
Russo-Japanese war at Nanshan, near Port Arthur, 4,500 Japanese and 3,000
Russians died. Oku sealed off Port Arthur by
land and sea.

1/5/1904.The Battle of the Yalu marked the start of theRusso-Japanese War.

13/4/1904.Russia lost its flagship
battleship Petropavlosk and 600 men to a mine in an ill-fated sortie from Port
Arthur.

31/3/1904.British forces
underMacDonald killed some 300
Tibetans attempting to halt a British mission to Tibet.

10/2/1904.Night attack by the Japanese crippled the Russian fleet at Port Arthur.

8/2/1904.The Russo-Japanese war broke out.This was provoked by Russian penetration into
Manchuria and Korea.By 1898 Russia had
secured the Pacific ice-free port of Port Arthur and had linked it to the
Trans-Siberian railway going to Vladivostock and beyond.Japan ousted the Russians from
Seoul, Korea.

The Russian army numbered 1,000,000
peacetime standing, plus 4,500,000 reserves; the Japanese army only comprised
150,000 men with 900,000 reserves. However the Russians faced a huge logistical
problem because most of their forces had to be transported from Europe. The
Trans-Siberian railway, still incomplete, was not up to the job. In an effort to resist the |Japanese they sent
their Baltic Fleet around the Cape to the Pacific; en route they sank two
British North Sea trawlers, thinking they were Japanese warships. See
30/1/1902. Fighting started when the Japanese attacked Port Arthur without
warning, sinking two battleships and a cruiser, trapping the rest of the fleet
in port. Only after this event did Japan declare war on Russia.

10/11/1903. 10,000 Chinese troops moved into Manchuria.

8/4/1902. Russia signed an agreement with China, promising to
withdraw its troops from Manchuria.

30/1/1902.Japan and the UK concluded a mutual defence alliance. See 8/2/1904 and 23/8/1914. Each country agreed
not to sign treaties with third nations without consulting the other; if one
country was attacked the other guaranteed to remain neutral, and furthermore if
a second country attacked, each would aid the other. Each needed an ally in the
region. British interests in China were threatened by other countries,
especially Germany, whilst Japan was under threat from Russian expansion in
Manchuria.

7/1/1902, Following the
suppression of the Boxer Rebellion,
the Chinese Imperial Court returned to Beijing.

7/12/1901, Japan abandoned
negotiations with Russia, and started to arrange an alliance with Britain.

7/9/1901. The Peace of
Peking ended the Boxer Rising in
China. It was signed by a Manchu prince, Li Hung-Chang, and eleven European powers.
Under this Treaty, ten Chinese officials were to be executed and 100 others
punished, China gave formal apologies, Chinese civil service exams were
suspended in 45 cities (so as to penalise the Chinese middle class), the
European Legation quarter was to be expand

ed and fortified, and permanently
garrisoned with troops, and key railway posts were to be manned by Western
troops to ensure access to Beijing from the sea, and a large indemnity was to
be paid by China.

29/4/1901.Birth of Crown Prince
Hirohito. Later Emperor of
Japan.

2/4/1901, A
proposed agreement between Russia and China for Russian occupation of Manchuria
was cancelled by China, after Chinese appeals for support from Britain, Japan
and Germany. For details see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manchuria

26/2/1901, Two leaders of China’s Boxer Rebellion were
publically executed in Beijing,
ending the 2-year rebellion against foreigners. Japanese soldiers led the men to their death. In January 1901
10,000 allied troops captured Beijing and ended a 56-day Boxer siege of the
foreign legations. The Chinese Dowager Tzu Hsi shared the beliefs of the
Boxers, the Society of Righteous Harmony Fists, and refused to act against
them. She has now fled Beijing; China had
to pay an indemnity for the deaths of 1,500 foreigners in the rebellion, and to
accept Western troops permanently stationed in Beijing.

14/8/1900.10,000 European
troops entered Beijing and ended the
56-day Boxer siege of the legations there.The Chinese Dowager fled Beijing, and accepted the foreign powers’
terms.These included punishment of 96
senior officials, large reparations in gold, an expression of regret, and the
acceptance of a string of foreign forts on Chinese territory.Some Boxer leaders were beheaded in public.

30/6/1900, European troops,
also from the US and Japan, occupied Tianjin, as the Boxer Rebellion progressed.

20/6/1900.The Boxer troops, and Dong Fuxiang’s Gansu troops,
began attacks on legations, churches, and other foreign establishments. They
murdered the German Ambassador in Peking.

18/6/1900, The
Empress of China ordered that all foreigners in the country were to be killed.

7/4/1900, Britain, France,
Germany and the US warned China to
suppress the Boxer movement, or face invasion.

30/12/1899, A British missionary was murdered in China, close
to Tsinan. As a result the British consul in Shanghai ordered that three
Chinese should be beheaded, also one to be strangled, another to serve 10 years
in prison, and another to be banished; furthermore, three village elders were
to be flogged. This incident illustrates
the weakness of the Chinese State at the time against British colonialism.

9/2/1899, The Boxer Rebellion gained momentum in China. Lack of rain had caused crops to fail, and Boxer
pamphlets blamed the Churches for ‘standing in the way of Heaven and angering
the Gods’. The Boxer publicity blamed ‘blue-eyed barbarians’ for angering the
ancestors and said railways, electric wires and ships must be destroyed.
Britain, France, Germany and Russia had forced territorial concessions from
China. The Boxers, or ‘society of harmonious fists’, were a secret society,
originally formed to promote boxing, who became dedicated to removing foreign
influence from China.

1/7/1898, China leased the New Territories (Hong Kong) to Britain for 99 years.

5/3/1898, Zhou Enlai, Chinese Premier, was born.

30/6/1897, The Shanghai
Foot Emancipation Society was founded. It was one of several such
organisations dedicated to eliminating
the custom of foot-binding which had been practiced on young aristocratic
Chinese girls, leaving them in some cases scarcely able to walk. This practice
dated from the 10th century AD; in China bound (small) feet were considered a
mark of beauty, and also a sign that the woman was wealthy enough not to have
to work. It also made her totally dependent upon her husband. As Christianity
penetrated China in the 1880s a move to make women equal in status to men
began, and to eliminate foot-binding. The Hundred Days Reform in 1898 also
aimed to stop this practice. By 1899 some 800,000 Chinese people has joined
anti-foot-binding societies. However the practice continued into the 20th
century, and in 1949 the Communist administration found it necessary to ban the
practice, still underway in remote rural areas. China retains a ban on
foot-binding today.

1/8/1895. The people of Gutian in Fujian Province, destroyed
churches and killed more than ten Australian and British missionaries,
including women and children.

2/6/1895, Japan took formal
possession of Formosa (Taiwan) from
China.

17/4/1895.Japan and
China signed the Peace Treaty of
Shimonoseki. China recognised the independence of Korea (although Japan did not have to recognise this), and
ceded Formosa (Taiwan), the
Pescadores Islands, and the Liaodong Peninsula, to Japan. China also had to pay a huge indemnity to Japan, and allow Japanese trade in four treaty ports, which would be exempt from
Chinese taxation. Rivalry between Japan and China over Korea had started this
war; the immediate cause was the assassination of a pro-Japanese politician in Korea, which gave Japan an excuse to send in troops. Japan opened hostilities without declaring
war, by sinking a Chinese troopship and machine-gunning the survivors. However
on 23/4/1895 Russia, France, and Germany intervened, forcing Japan to hand back the Liaodong Peninsula.

30/11/1895.China and Russia made a secret treaty so that Russia could build the
Trans-Siberian railway through Manchuria to the port of Vladivostock.

21/11/1894.Japan
defeated China at Port Arthur.

1/8/1894. War was formally declared between China and Japan.

27/7/1894, Korea
declared war on China.

25/7/1894, Japanese
forces sank the Kowshing, a British ship carrying Chinese forces to
Korea.

26/12/1893. Mao Tse Tung,
Chinese Communist leader, was born
in Hunan.He was the son of a peasant
farmer.

29/11/1890, In Japan, the Meiji Constitution came into effect.

11/7/1890, The first ever elections in Japan; the electorate comprised only
450,000 people.

11/2/1889.The Meiji Emperor in Japan, dressed for the occasion
in a European field-marshal’s uniform,
took his seat on a Prussian armchair in the European-looking throne room of the
palace of his new capital, Tokyo, and announced a new constitution providing
for Japan’s first parliamentary elections. ‘Meiji’ denoted an Age of Brightness and it was hoped this would be
the start of Japan as one of the great modern nations of the world. Japanese
cities did indeed become more ‘modern’ and European; cinemas and dance halls
appeared, frequented by ‘liberated’ young Japanese. However the constitution
was based on a Prussian model, tied
to the Confucian tradition of
respect for authority, and the electorate was very limited; ministers were
still picked by the emperor, not parliament. Japan remained a nation where the
emperor and the military had most of the real power, leading ultimately to its
participation in the Second World War. Some see 1964, when the Olympics were
held in Tokyo, as the turning point when the war and US occupation were put
behind and Japan became a ‘western’ nation.

30/6/1897, The Shanghai Foot Emancipation Society was
founded. It was one of several such organisations dedicated toeliminating the
practice of foot-binding which had been practiced on young aristocratic Chinese
girls, leaving them ion some cases scarcely able to walk. Thois prcaqtice dated
from the 10th century AD; in China bound (small) feet were
considered a mark of beauty, and also a sign that the woman was wealthy enough
not to have to work. It also made here totally dependent upon her husband. As Christianity
penetrated China in the 1880s a move to make women equal in status to men
began, and to eliminate foor-binding. The Hundred Days Reform in 1898 also
aimed to stop this practice. By 1899 some 800,000 Chinese people has joined
anti-foot-binding societies. However the practice continued into the 20th
century, and in 1949 the Communist administration found it necessary to ban the
practice, still underwasy in deep rural areas. China retains a ban on
foot-binding today.

31/10/1887, Chiang Kai-Shek, Chinese military leader and
politician, was born in Fenghua, Chekiang province.

9/6/1885, The Treaty
of Tientsin was signed, under which China recognised the French
Protectorate of Indo-China in return for France agreeing to respect China’s
southern border. See 26/10/1884.

17/11/1884. Chinese Turkestan was given provincial status, and
renamed Xinjiang, or New Frontier.

26/10/1884, China declared war on France after France
bombarded Taiwan as reprisal for China’s refusal to acknowledge the French
Protectorate of Indo-China, see 9/6/1885.

11/9/1883, Anti-European riots in Canton, China

25/8/1883, A Treaty was signed at Hue recognising Tonkin,
Cochin China and Annam as French Protectorates. However China rejected the
Treaty and resisted French interference in the region.

22/5/1882, The USA signed a treaty with Korea recognising its
independence from China, Russia, and Japan.

24/9/1877.In Japan, a Samurai rebellion which began in Satsuma in January 1876 was over
with the suicide of its leader Saigo Takamori. Saigo resigned from the Japanese
government when it decided not to invade Korea, and became leader of some
40,000 disaffected samurai, frustrated at being deprived of a foreign war. More
seriously for them, the samurai have
been overtaken by the establishment of a modern Japanese army, with firearms
and other technology. The Samurai were forbidden to wear their distinctive
military dress or carry swords; the Japanese government had assumed
responsibility for their stipends and cut them sharply.In
effect the samurai had become low grade civil servants.

27/2/1876, Japan and Korea signed the Treaty of Kanghwa. Until 1873 Korea,
governed by the xenophobic Regent Taewon-Gun, had rejected diplomatic
approaches by Japan. In 1875 Japanese
gunboats off Kanghwa Island, near Seoul, were fired upon by the Koreans. Japan
used this incident to force closer commercial and political links with Korea,
backed up by the Japanese Navy. The
Treaty of Kanghwa encouraged Western powers to also seek closer links with
Korea, ending its isolation and its status as a vassal state of China.

22/2/1875, Tensions between London and Beijing increased
after Augustus
Margary, a British official, was killed by bandits close to the
Burma-China border.

1/1875, Chinese Emperor Mu Zung
died aged 19. He was succeeded by his cousin Zaitian as the Guangxu Emperor.

10/1874, China agreed to pay
compensation to Japan, and Japan
withdrew its invasion force from Taiwan.

4/1874, Japan invaded Taiwan, justifying the action because
of the murder of 54 Japoanese sailors who had been shipwrecked there in 1871.

1871, The Meiji Government in Japan outlawed discrimination against the
Burakumin, the lowest-caste people in the country who worked in industries such
as tanning.

1870, The city of Sapporo in Hokkaido, Japan, was founded. The Japanese
population of Hokkaido began to rise significantly. Japanese Meiji Emperor Mutsuhito
ordered his subjects to take surnames.

3/1869, The Meiji Emperor of Japan accepted the surrender by four of the most
powerful Japanese clans (Choshu, Tosa, Hizen and Satsuma) of their territories.
The Clan Chiefs were reappointed as Provincial Governors, on reduced incomes.

4/7/1868, The last
resistance in Japan by pro-Tokugawa forces ceased, as they were defeated at the
Battle of Ueno, near Edo (eastern capital), now known as Tokyo.

6/4/1868, The
Japanese Government under Emperor Meiji issued a general policy
statement known as the Charter Oath, following
the overthrow of the Tokugawa Shogunate.
This Oath declared that ancient feudal social ranks and other practices would
be eliminated from Japanese society, and that a programme of moderniasation
based on Western values would be followed. Feudal rule that had prevailed in
Japan since 1185 ceased, and the Tokugawa Shogunate that had endured since 1603
ended.

3/1/1868, The 16-year-old Emperor Meiji
seized control of Japan from the Tokugawa Shogun, ending 700 years of military
rule. Japan was now more open to the
outside world.

9/11/1867, The Japanese Shogun Yoshinobo abdicated as pressure
increased to end the Shogun rule and restore the pre 12th century
rule by the Emperors. The late Emperor Komei’s son Mutsohito took power, aged 15.

14/10/1867, Okubo Toshimichi, a
senior courtier of the feudal Japanese House of Satsuma, travelled from the
capital, Edo, to the provincial town of Yamguchi to meet with leaders of the
Choshu clan. Toshimichi
proposed to overthrow the ruling Satsuma House, and succeeded in forming the
secret Satcho alliance, along with the Toza and Hizen clans.

1867, The Japanese Meiji Emperor Mutsuhito ascended the throne,
aged 15, and ruled until his death in 1912. He was without real power until the
Tokugawa
Shogun Yoshinobu abdicated in November 1866, after less thana year in office ending the military
government that had ruled Japan for nearly seven centuries. This paved the way
for the Meiji Restoration of 1868.

12/11/1866, Sun Yat Sen, President of China, was born.

6/9/1866, Three British tea clippers reached London within hours of each other
after a 16,000 mile race from China. The Serica, Taiping and Ariel left Foochow at the end of May
1866 ; the 200 foot clippers were the fastest ships yet built, sailing at over
20 mph.

8/1866, Japanese Shogun Iemochi
died. He was succeeded briefly by his kinsman, Yoshinobu, the last Tokugawa Shogun.

7/8/1865.In the continuing Muslim rebellion in Chinese Turkestan, Ya’qub Beg
captured the oasis towns of Kucha and Aksu and took the ruler Burhanuddin as
prisoner. On 7/9/1865 Ya’qub Beg captured Kashgar, slaughtering some 4,000 Han Chinese.

19/7/1864, The British Army under General Gordon assisted Tseng Kuo Fan’s Army to
sack Nanjing. Hung Hsiu Chuan committed suicide by poison as over 100,000 were
killed, and the Taiping Rebellion
was finally ended. See 19/3/1853.

1/1/1863, Under the Treaty of Edo (1858),
from this date British citizens could reside in Osaka, Japan, for the purposes
of trade.

25/6/1862.A Japanese
imperial decree expelled all foreigners,
contrary to advice from the Shogun.

24/10/1860.China gave way to
trade demands from Britain and France after fighting. Beijing was captured on
6/10/1860.

6/10/1860, An Anglo-French force invading China captured
Peking.

12/8/1860, The French and British bombarded Sinho, to force
China to admit their diplomats.

1/7/1859, The port city of
Nagasaki was opened to foreign commerce, according to the provisions of the Treaty of Edo.

1858, The Japanese
Tokugawa Shogun Iesada died aged 34 without an heir. He was
succeeded by the 12-year-old Iemochi, whom Iesada had nominated as his
successor. Iemochi
ruled until 1866.

29/7/1858, The Treaty of Edo was signed between Japan
and the USA. This extended US trading rights gained under the Treaty of
Kanagawa (1854) and further opened up Japan to Western influence.

29/6/1858, The Treaty of Tientsin ended the Anglo-Chinese
War. China agreed to open up more ports to trade.

28/5/1858. Russia acquired from China the territory on the
left (north) bank of the middle and upper River Amur, along with the territory
on both sides of the lower Amur. This was under the Treaty of Aigun.

31/3/1858, China gave in to
British and French demands for trade concessions.

3/3/1857, Britain and France declared war on China, using the killing of a missionary as a
pretext.

31/3/1854.The USA and Japan
signed the Treaty of Kanagawa,
opening up the Japanese ports of Shimoda and Hakodate to American trade.

7/9/1853, Shanghai fell to rebels as the Taiping
Rebellion continued.

8/8/1853, A Russian fleet arrived at Nagasaki on
a trading mission.

23/7/1853, The Japanese TokugawaShogun Ieoshi died, aged 61 after a 16-year
reign. He was succeeded by his 29-year-old brother, Iesada, who agreed to open two
Japanese ports to foreign trade.

8/7/1853.US Commodore Matthew Perry steamed
into Japan’s Edo Bay (now Tokyo) with his ‘black ships’ and demanded that the country open up
to US trade. He backed up his
demand with cannon fire. For 250 years Japan had been a feudal state run by the
Tokugawa shoguns.

19/3/1853, Taiping (Heavenly Peace) rebels in China, a Protestant movement, challenged the
ruling Manchu Ch’ing dynasty by taking the city of Nanjing. See 19/7/1864.

19/10/1851, Myeongseong,
Empress of Korea, was born.

22/8/1849, Amaral, the Portuguese Governor of Macao, was
assassinated for his pro-Chinese policies.

24/10/1844.France
and China signed the Treaty of Whampoa,
opening up Chinese ports to French trade. French traders came under French, not
Chinese, law, and the French gained the right to build Catholic churches in the
treaty ports of China.

3/7/1844.China and the USA signed the Treaty
of Wanghiya, giving US citizens similar rights to those of the UK in the
Treaty of Nanjing signed in 1843. US traders now had access to the same five
Chinese trading ports as Britain did.

1/12/1843.China again banned
opium smoking, the cause of the Opium War. However the Chinese already
had an insatiable appetite for it, andignored this decree. Opium smuggling into China was rampant, run by
gangsters such as the Triads.

17/11/1843.In accordance with the Treaty
of Nanjing (see 29/8/1842) Shanghai was opened up to foreign trade.

8/10/1843, Britain and China signed the British Supplementary
Treaty; an addition to the Treaty of Nanjing (29/8/1842), giving Britain
favourable trading terms with China. See 3/7/1844.

29/8/1842.The Opium War
(1839-1842) between Britain and China ended (see 26/1/1841) with the Treaty of Nanjing. China ceded Hong
Kong Island in perpetuity to Britain and opened up five ports to foreign
trade. There was further humiliation
for the Chinese; they were to pay
US$21million over the next 5 years for the opium they destroyed, which started
the war. On 5/4/1843 Queen Victoria
proclaimed Hong Kong a British Crown Colony.

26/1/1841.Hong
Kong was proclaimed British territory. It was occupied by British troops as
the Opium War with China continued. It was ceded by China on 20/1/1841,
in what the Chinese termed the ‘Unequal
Treaties’.The much larger
area known as the ‘New Territories’ was leased from China until 1997.This area contained Hong Kong’s water
supplies and the whole territory was returned to China then.

See 5/7/1840, and 29/8/1842.

20/1/1841, Hong Kong
was ceded to Britain by China, see 26/1/1841.

5/7/1840.In the Opium War (see 4/9/1839), British naval forces bombarded
Dinghai on Zhousan Island and then occupied it. See 26/1/1841. This war is not
just about opium but the right to force
China to open its ports to British trade.

20/2/1840, In the UK, Palmerston ordered the British Navy to attack China in order to prevent
the suppr4ession of the opium trade.

30/1/1840, The Emperor of China forbade all trade with Britain.

3/11/1839, Britain began to
assemble an expeditionary military force
as relations with China deteriorated
over the opium trade issue.

4/9/1839.The British fired
the first shots on the Chinese in the Opium War, see 24/3/1839. On
3/11/1839 British and Chinese forces clashed near the Bogue Forts at the mouth
of the Pearl River. The formal declaration of the Opium War was in June
1840. see 5/7/1840.

24/3/1839.The Chinese blockaded foreign owned opium factories. This was to force the
factories to hand over their opium stocks for destruction. The Chinese destroyed 20,000 chests of opium
belonging to British traders, worth US$ 12 million. Opium had been imported
from India to China since the 17th century, but was now ruining the
Chinese economy. European tea imports
from China had been paid for in silver but the merchants forced them to accept
opium instead. The British also refused to hand over sailors who killed a
Chinese peasant in a drunken pub brawl. News of this reached London on
5/8/1839, and on 23/8/1839 the British assembled a fleet of warships off Hong
Kong. See 4/9/1839.

12/12/1838.In China, a riot broke out when British and American opium traders drove away
Chinese officials intending to execute a native opium dealer in front of
the foreign owned opium factories.

10/3/1839, An
imperial Chinese official named Lin Zexu arrived at Canton with orders from Emperor
Daoguang to eradicate the opium trade.

1736, Chi’en Lung became Emperor of China aged 25,
commencing the Ch’ing Dynasty that
endured until 1796. He extended Chinese control far into central Asia.

8/10/1735, Qianlong
succeeded Yongzheng
as Emperor of China.

1720, Tibet became a dependency of China. Apart from
foreign and military affairs, China largely left Tibet alone until te 20th
century.

7/9/1689, China
signed the Treaty of Nerchinsk with Russia. This was the first treaty signed by China
with another country as opposed to a vassal state. The Treaty settled
border disputes in the Amur region.

5/2/1661, Emperor Kangxi
began his reign in China; he ruled for over 61 years.

1643, Abahai (born 1592), Manchu leader, 8th
son of Nurhaci,
died. He rose to supremacy over the other senuor Manchu princes, becoming sole leader. Under his rule, from his
capital at Mukden Abahai extended the Manchu empire into Korea and Mongolia, and raided northern China.
In 1636 Abahai
proclaimed himself Emperor of the Qing
Dynasty; this invaded China in 1644.

1636, The Qing Dynasty
was founded by the Manchus.

30/9/1626, Manchu
leader Nurhaci
died (born 1559)

1573, In China, Wan Li became Emperor at age 10.
He ruled for 47 years as Emperor Shen Zong.

1557, The Portuguese first obtained
permission from China to trade at Macao.

1517, The Portuguese became the
first Europeans to visit Taiwan.
They called it Ilha Formosa, meaning
‘beautiful island’.

5/8/1424, Emperor
Chu Ti, also known as Yung Lo or Ch’eng Tsu, died (born
2/5/1360). Under his rule China sent out exploration fleets, between 1403 and
1433, under the command of the Muslim eunuch Cheng Ho (Zheng He). These
expeditions reached Java, southern India, the Persian Gulf, the Red Sea and
eastern Africa as far south as Zanzibar. He also maintained peaceable relations
with the Mongols and other peoples, as far as the Amur River and west to Herat
and Samarkand.

1421, China transferred the capital from
Nanjing to Beijing.

1416, Zheng He’s ships reached Aden.

29/11/1394, The capital city of the Joseon Dynasty in
present-day Korea was moved from
Gaegyeong (now Gaeseong) to Hanseong
(now Seoul).

1392, The Yi Dynasty, which ruled Korea until 1910, was founded by warlord I Songgye.

1368, Zhu Yuanzhang, founder of the Ming Dyansty, made Nanjing the capital
of China.

2/5/1360, Emperor
Chu Ti, also known as Yung Lo or Ch’eng Tsu, was born. See
5/8/1424.

1071, Eastern Tibet disintegrated into small states, paving the way for
penetration by China.

1068, Chinese Emperor Shen
Tsung began a 17-year reign. He was a radical reformer.

30/4/1063, Renzong,
Emperor of China, died.

1004, The earliest mention of gunpowder, in China. Gunpowder, a mixture
of saltpetre (potassium nitrate, the white powder that forms in organic-rich
environments protected from rainfall, sulphur and charcoal, powdered together,
is explosive because the potassium nitrate provides the oxygen for very rapid
combustion; gunpowder is stable at room temperature but can be set off by
temperatures above 300 C. Gunpowder gave
the West the gun, which was to demolish the ancient chivalric knightly
horse-based warfare of the Mediaeval period, and give the infantry the upper
hand. Gunpowder likewise demolished the power of the Japanese Samurai, when the
gun entered Japanese society. Early guns (cannon) were in use in Europe by
1326, but were low-powered and inaccurate until metallurgists found how to cast
strong barrels to contain and direct larger explosive charges, from the 1400s.
See 1673.

960, The Sung Dynasty, which ruled China until 1279, was established by Chao K’uang-yin
who began to reunite China. He ruled until 976 as (Sung) T’ai Tsu. The Sung Dynasty overlapped with the Mongol
Yuan Dynasty, which began in 1260.

713, The Chinese Emperor
Ming Huang acceded to the throne; he ruled
until 756. He promoted the arts and learning.

16/12/705, Empress Wu Hou of China died. Born
in 625, she became a junior concubine in the palace of Emperor Tai Tsung in 638; on his death in 649 she became very
close to his successor, Kao Tsung. In 655 she became
Empress. By 660 Emperor Kao Tsung was very ill and Wu Hou was effective ruler of China. Between 655 and 675 China
conquered Korea. In 690 Wu Hou officially became
Empress. In February 705 Chinese government ministers forced her to abdicate in
favour of her son, Chung Tsung.

639, In Tibet, King Sbrong Tsan Sgam Po introduced Buddhism from India, and founded Lhasa.

627, Chinese Emperor Kao Tsu abdicated after a 9-year reign. He was
succeeded by his son who ruled as Emperor T’ai Tsung until 649.

621, In China, an
imperial bureau was established to regulate the manufacture of porcelain.

618, In China the T’ang Dynasty began; it lasted until
907. This dynasty was founded by an official of the Sui regime who now began
ruling as Emperor Kao Tsu (meaning, High
Progenitor).

T’ang Dynasty

4/8/598,: Emperor Wendi ordered
his youngest son, Yang Liang, to
conquer Korea during the rainy
season, with a Chinese army (300,000 men).

522, The
earliest known pagoda in China was
built at the Sung Yuen Temple in Honan. The structure derived from the tall
Indian stupa.

502, Chinese
Emperor Wu Ti began a
47-year reign.

427, The
Korean King Changsu made
Pyongyang the capital of the country.

4/10/23, After disastrous floods in China as the Yellow River changed course
several times between 2AD and 11 AD, causing famine, starving rebel peasants
stormed the Chinese Imperial Palace. Emperor Wang Mang attempted to marshal magical
forces in defence, in vain, and he was killed in fighting on 6/10/23. His
attempts to curb usury and promote social welfare had aroused considerable
hostility.

10/1/9, Wang Mang assumed the title of Emperor of
China, replacing the Han
Dynasty by the new H’sin Dynasty.

3/2/6,Chinese
Emperor P’ing suddenly died; some suspected Wang Mang of poisoning him.Wang Mang
arranged for the youngest of some 50 possible successors, a 1 year old baby, to
be the new Emperor; Wang Mang became Acting Emperor.

15/8/1 BCE, Emperor
Ai
of China died. Wang Mang became Regent once
more, at the behest of Wang Mang’s aunt, the Empress
Dowager.Wang Mang quickly arranged for his 14 year old daughter to be the
Empress of the new Chinese Emperor, P’ing.

27/8/7 BCE, Under the rule of Emperor Ai of China, Wang Mang resigned the
regency. Ai disliked Wang Mang, and he was sent to
his country estates.

17/4/7 BCE, Emperor
Ch’eng of China died, without an heir.

28/11/8 BCE, Wang Mang became Regent of China.

100 BCE, Chinese maritime explorers first reached the coast
of India.

115 BCE, Chinese armies invaded the Lop Nor region and Tarim
basin.

140 BCE, The Chinese Han Dynasty Emperor, Wu Ti, began a 53-year reign during which he conquered
parts of Tonkin and Korea. He also sent his emissariy, Chang Ch’ien, far to the west to Bactria and
Sogdiana, to seek alliances against the Huns
(Hsiung Nu)

202 BCE, The last Qin Emperor died. He was succeeded by a
minor official, inaugurating the Han Dynasty.

210 BCE, Shi Huangdi died.

215 BCE, The Great
Wall of China, 1,400 km long, was completed.

221 BCE, Start of the Qin Dynasty. China was
united under Shi Hunagdi, the Great Wall was built, along with roads
and canals, also theChinese script, the
system of weights and measures, and the legal system, were standardised.

356 BCE, The first Great
Wall was built, to protect against Hun invasions.

479 BCE, Death of Kung Fu-tse, Chinese philosopher (born 551
BCE).

27/8/551 BCE, Confucius was born.

565 BCE, Lao
Tse founded the belief system of Taoism.

604 BCE, Lao
Tse, Chinese philosopher, born.

1100 BCE, First Chinese dictionary was compiled.

1122 BCE, The Shang Dynasty (see 1766 BCE) was overthrown by
the Zhou Dynasty, a Chinese
speaking people from the Shanxi area. Wu Wang, son of Wen Wang, was the first Zhou ruler. Start of a flourishing of Chinese
art, literature and philosophy; the start of Confucianism. The Zhou Dynasty endured until 256 BCE.

1766 BCE, Start of Shang Dynasty in China (see
1122 BCE); earliest recorded dynasty in China. Emerging from the earlier Hsia (Xia) Neolithic culture (see 2205
BCE), the Shang was centred on the Henan area; it was
differentiated from the ‘barbarians to the north’ by sophisticated bronze
tools,ancestor worship, and an established warrior aristocracy with chariots.
See 1122 BCE.

2205 BCE, Start of the Hsia Culture
in China (see 1766 BCE).

3500 BCE, Urban centres developed in China. Cities had walls and rammed-earth
platforms. Social stratification began with the wealthy trading in luxury
items.

9000 BCE, Evidence of hunter-gatherer and fishing lifestyle from caves in
central China.

Appendix One – North & South Korea post-World
War Two

Korean
War 1950-53

Nuclear and missile events

28/11/2017, North Korea test fired a missile which flew 1,000 km towards the Sea
of Japan. This missile attained a height in excess of 100 km then re-entered
the atmosphere, proving that North Korea has missiles with a re-entry
capability.

14/9/2017, North Korea fired another missile over the Japanese island of Hokkaido, into the Pacific Ocean. The
missile rose to an altitude of 770 km, and travelled 3,700 km, which would have
taken it to Guam had it travelled southwards not east.

3/9/2017, North Korea detonated a test Hydrogen Bomb underground in its
north-east. The test produced a magnitude 6.3 earthquake. The missile was
reported to be capable of being fitted on an ICBM and hitting the USA.

28/8/2017, North Korea test fired a missile, which overflew the northern Japanese
island of Hokkaido, travelled 1,000
km and landed in the Pacific. Japan protested at the intrusion into its
airspace.

28/7/2017, North Korea launched a further missile, which landed inside the
Japanese Economic Zone waters. The missile attained a height which indicated it
had intercontinental ballistic capabilities, threatening the US.

4/7/2017, North Korea test-fired a ballistic
missile which flew 930 km/580 miles, on US Independence Day.

13/6/2017, Otto Warnbier, a 22-year old
student at the University of Virginia, was unexpectedly released from North
Korea after more than a year in detention following his conviction for stealing
a propaganda poster whilst on a tour of the country. He had been sentenced to
15 years hard labour for this offence following a 1-hour trial. He was returned
in a state of severe brain damage, and died on 19/6/2017. The cause of his
brain damage has not been determined.

8/6/2017, North Korea test-fired a further land to sea missile.

7/6/2017, North Korea test-fired 4 anti-ship missiles.

29/5/2017, North Korea fired a short-range ballistic
missile that flew for 280 miles in 6 minutes before landing in the Sea of
Japan. This was reported to be the second
test-firing of a missile in two days by North Korea.

21/5/2017,
North Korea test-fired a further ballistic
missile.

13/5/2017, North Korea test fired a further ballistic
missile, which flew 430 miles. It fell into the sea between Russia and
Japan,

28/4/2017, North Korea test-fired a further ballistic
missile.

16/4/2017, The day after North Korea’s annual celebrations of ‘The Day of the
Sun’ (15 April, the anniversary of the birth of the founder of North Korea, President Kim
Il Sung), with a large military parade in Pyongyang, North Korea
attempted to launch an intercontinental ballistic rocket. However the rocket
blew up on the launch pad. President Trump of the USA had, stationed a naval
strike force just off North Korea, ready to strike either Pyongyang or the
rocket launch pads. On 17/4/2017 North
Korea threatened to conduct one missile test every week.

10/4/2017, The US sent the large
aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson to the sea off North Korea, as a show of force.

5/4/2017, North Korea test-fired a medium
range missile which they said was capable of destroying a US aircraft
carrier. The missile failed.

6/3/2017, North Korean artillery fired four
missiles into the Sea of Japan, as part of an exercise simulating a North
Korean attack on US bases in Japan; some missiles landed within 200 miles of
Japan. Japanese
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe called the move ‘extremely dangerous’.

12/2/2017, North Korea successfully launched a solid-fuel Pukguksong-2 missile from a submarine. This was an act of defiance
against the new Trump administration in the US.

9/9/2016, North Korea conducted its 5th nuclear test, the largest to
date.

7/2/2016, North Korea launched a
satellite into orbit. The US and South Korea made strong protests, because
the same rocket technology could be used for an intercontinental nuclear strike.

6/1/2016, North Korea claimed to have exploded a Hydrogen Bomb in an underground test. China, North Korea’s closest
ally expressed anger over this and over claims that North Korea had also succeeded
in firing a missile from a submarine. However the explosion was smaller than
would be expected from a true Hydrogen Bomb, and may have been a ‘boosted
fission’ bomb instead.

20/8/2015, Kim Jong Un, President of North
Korea, put his troops on a war footing in reaction to South Korea blasting
propaganda messages by loudspeaker across the border. Seoul said the propaganda
broadcasts, the first since 2004, were in retaliation for a landmine that
maimed two South Korean soldiers. North Korea threatened to shoot out the
loudspeakers. There was also exchange of gunfire between the two countries.

2/4/2013, North Korea said it would restart its nuclear reactor at Yongbyon.

11/3/2013, North Korea cut the phone line with the South, breaking the 1953
Armistice terms.

7/3/2013, The UN Security Council unanimously agreed to tighten sanctions on
North Korea.

12/2/2013, North Korea conducted a 3rd underground nuclear
test, provoking fears of war with the USA.

12/12/2012, North Korea successfully launched a satellite using its Unha-3
rocket, see 13/4/2012.

18/7/2012, Kim Jong Un was officially
appointed Supreme Leader of North Korea.

13/4/2012, North Korea launched
a satellite, which exploded soon after take-off. The USA condemned the move.
The rocket used was the Unha-3, which could theoretically carry a nuclear
missile to the mainland USA. See 12/12/2012.

23/11/2010, North Korea shelled the South Korean island of Yeonpyeong.

26/3/2010, North Korea was blamed for the sinking of a South Korean naval
vessel, the Cheonan, killing 46 of
the 104 aboard.

25/5/2009, North Korea announced that it had conducted a second successful
underground nuclear test; America condemned the move.

5/4/2009, North Korea fired a rocket, ostensibly to carry a satellite.
The UN held an emergency session, but took no action.

13/2/2007, North Korea agreed to close its nuclear facility at Yongbyon by 14/4/2007 in return for
energy aid equivalent to 50,000 tons of heavy fuel oil.

9/10/2006, North Korea claimed to
have conducted its first ever nuclear test explosion.

7/2006, The UN and Japan imposed sanctions on N Korea, and South Korea halted
food aid.

2005, North Korea announced it had nuclear weapons.

19/9/2005, North Korea agreed to stop building nuclear reactors in exchange for
aid and co-operation.

2003, North
Korea withdrew from the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty.

2002, The US
suspended help to North Korea in building two nuclear reactors, over suspicions
that the country was secretly enriching uranium for a bomb. United Nations
inspectors were expelled from the Yongbyon nuclear facility.

14/6/2000, Talks between North and
South Korea.

1999, North
Korea agreed to stop testing long-range missiles.

1998, North
Korea fired a Taedong missile over Japan.

1994, North Korea shut down its nuclear reactor at Yongbyon, which had been producing plutonium. This was in exchange
for US aid and assistance in producing civilian nuclear power.

8/7/1994. North Korean President Kim Il Sung (born 1912) died.

11/3/1993.North Korea
threatened to withdraw from the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, but did not
in fact leave.

15/4/1988, North
Korean PresidentKim Il Sung received 43,000 gifts as he
instituted lavish celebrations for his 76th birthday.

1986, North Korea started operations at the 5-megawatt Yongbyon nuclear reactor, which had
been built with Soviet help.

1/9/1983. A South Korean airliner was shot down by Soviet
fighter planes after it had strayed into USSR airspace, killing 269 people.

14/10/1982. 5,837 people were married simultaneously in Seoul,
South Korea; the world’s largest mass
wedding.

1975, Sweden became the first
Western country to set up an embassy in Pyongyang, North Korea.

21/1/1968, North Korean commandos made an
assassination attempt upon President Park of South Korea, getting within
300 metres of the Presidential Palace.

19/7/1965, Syngman Rhee, first President of the Republic of
Korea (1948-60) died in Hawaii.

20/7/1954.The Geneva Agreement ended hostilities between North and South Korea.

10/10/1953.President Eisenhower of the USA signed a treaty with South Korea promising military aid if
North Korea attacked.

27/7/1953. Armistice signed in Panmunjom, Korea,
ended the Korean War. The 3-year conflict cost an
estimated 4 million lives. These included 1,313,000 South Koreans, 1,000,000 of
whom were civilians; 900,000 Chinese soldiers, 520,000 North Korean soldiers,
and 1,000,000 North Korean civilians. There were 33,629 US casualties and 3,194
UN soldiers were killed. Across Korea, 43% of industrial facilities and 33% of
homes were destroyed.

31/12/1952, China
now had 1,200,000 troops under Peng TeHuai fighting alongside North Korea.

10/7/1951, Negotiations began between the USA and USSR over the Korean conflict.
The USSR demanded a return to the 38th parallel; the US insisted on
the current front line as the frontier. The US also rejected Chinese demands
for a withdrawal of all foreign troops from Korea. PoWs were also an issue,
with the US holding 171,000 prisoners, 50,000 of whom did not wish to return to
Communist rule. Many North Koreans and Chinese wished to go to South Korea or
Taiwan. The Communists, afraid of losing face, wanted all returned. Both sidcs
wanted an end to the conflict; Dwight D Eisenhower, in office from 1953, was
concerned at the expense of the war. Stalin’s death in 1953 in March 1953 eased
the deadlock. Most of the PoWs who wanted to defect to Western countries were
allowed to do so.

11/4/1951.General MacArthur was relieved of his command by President Truman, after disagreeing over the
conduct of the Korean War.MacArthur wanted to carry the war over into
Communist China, and bomb Chinese bases in Manchuria.MacArthur returned to a heroes
welcome in Washington, but did not realise his hopes of nomination for the US
Presidential elections. From now until the Armistice of 1953 both sides fought
holding actions to maintain current positions; US forces were slightly north of
the 38th parallel.

31/3/1951, In the Korean
War, UN / US forces once again reached the 38th parallel, the border
between North and South.

4/1/1951, Seoul was
evacuated by US forces (again). However at Pyongtaek, 50 km south of Seoul, the
Chinese-North Korean offensive was halted. A UN counter-offensive began in late
January.

1/1/1951,Chinese and North Korean forces advanced through UN
lines and captured Seoul.

28/12/1950.Chinese forces
in Korea crossed the 38th parallel.

28/11/1950.China entered
the Korean War; 200,000 troops entered Korea across the Yalu River. UN troops were forced back south again. On
28/12/1950 Chinese forces crossed the 38th parallel. The West had
ignored Chinese threats to intervene if US forces crossed north of the 38th
parallel.

24/11/1950, South Korean
forces began an offensive in the Yalu Valley; China planned intervention to support the North.

26/10/1950. US forces advancing in North
Korea reached the Yalu River, the border between North Korea and China.

19/10/1950.US and South Korean
forces captured Pyongyang, during the Korean War. The UN General Assembly declared an aim of a united Korea.

28/6/1950, British Royal
navy ships joined the US forces in South Korea.

27/6/1950.North
Korean forces took Seoul. British forces joined the war in Korea.

26/6/1950, US President
Truman sent US forces to support South Korea.

25/6/1950. Start of the
Korean War. North Korea invaded the South, crossing the 38th
parallel, which was the border.

30/1/1950, North Korea
Chairman, Kim
Il-sung, was informed that Soviet leader Joseph Stalin had decided to
support Kim's
plan for an invasion of South Korea. Stalin provided the message to Kim
by way of Soviet envoy Terenti Shtykov, after having met with Chinese
leader Mao
Zedong in Moscow.

29/6/1949, US troops
completed their withdrawal from South
Korea, leaving behind just 500 men to serve as advisors to the
98,000-strong South Korean armed forces, a body barely large enough to maintain
internal order, let alone deal with any threat from North Korea.

7/6/1949, In a
statement to US Congress, President Harry S Truman, talking about
measures necessary to prevent Communist domination of the Pacific, declared that Korea had become a testing
ground in the ideological conflict between Communism and democracy.

17/3/1949, The USSR
agreed to provide heavy military equipment to North Korea.

9/9/1948,Following
the withdrawal of Russian troops, North
Korea became independent as the People’s Democratic Republic of North
Korea.

15/8/1948.The Republic of Korea
was proclaimed in the south of the peninsula; Syngman
Rhee was the first President. On
9/9/1948 a Communist republic was set up in North Korea.

31/5/1948, The South Korean National Assembly elected Syngman Rhee as Chairman.

14/11/1947. The UN recognised the
independence of Korea.

23/8/1946, In North Korea, the Workers Party was established. By
December 1946 its membership reached 600,000 (total population of North Korea
was then 9 million).

14/10/1945, Kim Il Sung returned
to North Korea (in the uniform of a Soviet Red Army Major) to receive a hero’s
welcome. Soviet policy in North Korea
was to install North Korean Communists in key positions swiftly after the War
ended to reinforce Communist rule in the northern half of the country.

10/10/1945, The
Communist Party of Korea was founded. North Korea observes Party Foundation Day
every October 10 as a national holiday.

6/9/1945, A leftist committee led by Woon Hyung Lyuh proclaimed
itself the official Government of an independent South Korea. However the US
under Lieutenant
John R Hodge, Commanding General of US forces in Korea, refused to
recognise this Government. The US wanted to establish a trusteeship to
supersede both the US military administration in the South and the
Soviet-backed administration in the North. The Korean Government in exile
declared itself as a political party, not the government.

11/8/1945, The US drafted
General Order No.1, providing for Japanese forces in Korea north of the 38th
parallel to surrender to the Soviets; those south of the 38th
parallel to surrender to the Americans. The Soviets began to seal off the North
at the 38th parallel, whilst the US was keen to halt any further
southwards penetration by Russian soldiers.

Appendix Two – Japan pre-1850

14/6/1838, Birth of
the Japanese statesman Yamagata Aritomo (see 1/2/1922).

1837, The Japanese Tokugawa Shogun Ienari abdicated, aged 64,
after a 44-year reign. Ienari attempted extensive governmental
reforms, which were resisted; he also improved the education system. He was
succeeded by his 45-year-old son, Ieyoshi, whose reign was marked by increasing
demands for restorarion of imperial power, and for increased trade links with
the outside world. Ieyoshi ruled until 1853.

1786, Japan’s feebke-minded Tokugawa Shogun Ieharu died aged
49 after a 26-year reign. He was succeeded 13-year-old Ienari, who took power in 1793
after a 6-year regency. Ienari ruled until his abdication in 1837.

1760, Tokugawa Shogun Ieshige abdicated, aged 40, ill and
addicted to alcohol, after 15 years in power. He was succeeded by the
23-year-old son of the late Shogun Yoshimune, who ruled until 1786 as Shogun Ieharu
despite mental incompetence.

1745, Tokugawa Shogun Yoshimune resigned and was succeeded after
29 years in office by Ieshige, who remained Shogun until 1760.

1720, The ban on Western books being imported into Japan
was lifted; only religious books remained proscribed.

1716, Japanese Tokugawa Shogun Ietsogu died aged 7 after a
4-year reign. He was succeeded by the 39-year-old Yoshimune, who ruled until 1745.
Yoshimune
allowed the Dutch to import books at Deshima, he encouraged trade with the
West, and he orgsanised irrigation projects to improve agriculture.

1712, The Japanese Tokugawa Shogun Ienobu died aged 50
after a 3-year reign. He was succeeded by his 3-year-old son who ruled as Ietsugu
until 1716.

1709, The Japanese Tokugawa Shogun Sunayoshi died aged
62, after a reign of nearly 29 years. He was succeeded by his 47-year-old
cousin who ruyled until 1712 as Ienobu.

1703, The
Incident of the Forty Seven Ronin. In 1701 a quarrel between a
minor feudal lord and a powerful official of the Court of the Shogun resulted
in the Shogunate official being wounded by the feudal lord, at the Shogun’s
Court in Edo. For this incident, the feudal lord was ordered to commit suicide
and his lands were confiscated. Asaresult the lord’s Samurai retainers then became ronin, or masterless Samurai, much diminished in status. Forty
Seven of these ronin then vowed to take revenge and waited for an opportunity
to kill the Shogunate official, which time came in 1703; this despite the fact
that the ronin knew they themselves would have to die for this act. For their
unflinching loyalty to their former master, these ronin then became heroic symbols of self-sacrifice.

19/1/1657, The
Japanese city of Edo was destroyed in a huge fire; over 100,000 people died.

30/10/1654, The
Japanese Emperor Go-Komyo died (born 1633).

28/2/1638, Japanese
peasants occupying Hara Castle, near Nagasaki, surrendered to Shogun Iemitsu’s
besieging 124,000-strong army because of lack of food. The army then massacred
most of the 37,000 peasants. Furhermore Iemitsu expelled the Portuguese traders from Japan,
suspecting them of complicity in stirring up the peasant’s demands, and
prohibited the building of large seagoing ships that might carry Japanese to
other countries. The isolation of Japan
began.

12/1637, The Japanese Shogun Iemitsu began besieging the peasant
rebels on the Shimabara Peninsula.

1636, The Japanese Shogun Iemitsuforbade foreign travel.

4/6/1615, The
Japanese Shogun
Ieyasu took Osaka after a
6-month siege.

1601, The Regent Ieyasu established a chain of 53 inns
between Edo and Osaka at which travellers could stay overnight and obtain fresh
horses.

1600. Tokugawa Ieyasi forbade foreign travel.

18/9/1598, Toyotomi Hideyoshi, Japanese statesman (born
6/2/1537) died. A feudal lord of peasant origin, he completed the unification
of Japan under Oda Nobunaga. This was accomplished by the
defeat of the feudal barons (daimyo). He instituted a rigid system of class
divisions, having farmers, merchants, monks and warriors living in different
quarters of Japanese towns. In 1592 he attempted to take the Korean Peninsula from
China, but his army was too small for this task. In 1597 he tried again, also
unsuccessfully. He even harboured ambitions of much wider conquests, including
China, the Philippines and India. His death left a power vacuum that
plunged Japan into civil war.

5/2/1597, In Japan, Toyotomi Hideyoshi crucified 26 Christians in Nagasaki, then told all
remaining missionaries to leave the country. When most defied the order, Hideyoshi took no action for fear of alienating Portuguese traders.

1592, Hideyoshi invaded Korea; he failed, and also
failed on a subsequent invasion attempt in 1597.

1590, Tokyo, then known as Yedo (estuary-gate) was chosen by Tokugawa
Iyeyasu as national capital.

1586, Kabuki Theatre began in Japan.

1585, General Toyotomi Hideyoshi became Shogun, military dictator,
of Japan.

1583, General Toyotomi Hideyoshi laid the foundations of Osaka Castle.

1577, Hideyoshi built Himeji Castle.

1575, At the Battle of
Nagashino, Nobunaga armed his 3,000 foot soldiers with
muskets. They succeeded in defeating a
much larger force of mounted Samurai.

1568, Oda
Nobunaga captured
Tokyo.

15/8/1549, Francis Xavier entered the
Japanese port of Kagoshima to begin a conversion work.

1543, Guns first entered Japan. A Chinese ship was wrecked off
Kyushu, with two Portuguese on board carrying muskets. The local governor
bought these muskets and replicated them.
Firearmseventually made the Samurai redundant, as they did the European knights.

6/2/1537, Toyotomi
Hideyoshi,
Japanese statesman, was born (see 18/8/1598).

9/6/1526, Emperor No-Gara became ruler of Japan.

1467, In Japan, Shogun Yoshimasa named his brother Yoshime as
his sucxcessor, but this was challenged by supporters of his son, Yoshihisa.
10 years of civil war began in Japan.

1392, 56 years of
civil war between
northern and southern dynasties in Japan ended with the agreement that power
would alternate between the two branches of the Imperial family. In practice, the north never relinquished
power.

1336, Daigo
II was exiled. The
Ashikaga family ruled as Shoguns
until 1568. Civil
war broke out, lasting until 1392.

1325, The No plays
were developed in Japan.

26/11/1288, Go-Daigo, Emperor of Japan, was born.

12/8/1281, Battle of
Kōan (Hakata Bay). The invaders were contained on a beachhead and for two
months Samuria warriors fought to repel them, The
second Mongol invasion of Japan was foiled, as, once again (as in 1274) a
large typhoon – famously called a kamikaze, or divine wind – destroyed
much of the combined Chinese and Korean fleet and forces, numbering over
140,000 men and 4,000 ships.

20/11/1274, Kublai Khan's Yuan Dynasty attempted the first of several
invasions of Japan (30,000 soldiers and support personnel sails from Korea);
after the Mongols captured outlying islands, they were repulsed on the main
island at the Battle of Bun'ei by amassed Japanese warriors and a strong storm
which battered their forces and fleet. Credit for the storm — called a kamikaze,
or divine wind — was given by the Japanese to the god Raiden. See also
12/8/1281.

1192, Minamoto Yoritomo begane Shogun of Japan.

1191, Zen Buddhism was introduced to Japan by the 50-year old priest Aeisai,
who had returned from China.

1185, In Japan, the ruling Taira Clan was deposed by the Minamoto. The Japanese Emperors had by now become
mere puppets, with the Shoguns (military generals) holding the real power). The
Emperors dod not regain power until 1868.

1168, Japanese Emperor Rokujo was deposed, aged 4, and
succeeded by his 7-year-old uncle who ruled until 1180 as Emperor Takakura.

1165, Emperor Nijo abdicated, and died soon after, He was succeeded by
his infant son who ruled until 1168 as Emperor Rokujo.

1158, Emperor Goshirakawa abdicated after a 3-year reign. He was succeeded by
his 15-year-old son, Nijo, who began a 7-year reign.

1155, Japanese Emperor Konoe died aged 16, after a 14-year
reign. He was succeeded by Emperor Goshirakawa, in the middle of a
succession struggle which Goshirakawa survived in 1156.

1141, Japanese Emperor Sutoku abdicated aged 22 after an
18-year reign. He was succeeded by his 2-year-old half-brother Konoe,
who ruled until 1155.

1123, Emperor Toba abdicated, aged 20, in favour of his 4-year-old
uncle and stepson, Sutoku, son of the late Shirakawa. Sutoku reigned until 1141.

1107, Emperor Horikawa died aged 28 after a 21-year reign. He was
succeeded by his 4-year-old son, Toba, who reigned until 1123.

1072, Emperor Gosanjo abdicated, aged 38, due to illness; he died in
1073. He was succeeded by his 19-year-old son, Shirakawa, who reigned until
1086.

1068, Emperor Goreizei died aged 39, after a 23-year reign. He was
succeeded by his 34-year-old brother, Gosanjo, who ruled until `1072.

1045, Emperor Gosuzako died aged 36 after a 9-year reign, He was succeeded
by his 16-year-old son, who ruled until 1069 as Emperor Goreizei.

1036, Japanese Emperor Goichijo died aged 28 after a 20-year
reign. He was succeeded by his 27-year-old brother who ruled until 1045 as Emperor
Gosuzako.

1016, The blind Emperor Sanjo abdicated at age 40. He was
succeeded by the 8-year-old son of the late Ichijo, who ruled until 1036 as Emperor
Goichijo.

1011, Japanese Emperor Ichijo died aged 31 after a 25 year
reign He was succeeded by his 35 –year-old cousin, Sanjo, who ruled until 1016, but
began to lose his eyesight soon after acceding.

1000, Emperor Ijicho, now aged 20, made his 25-year-old wife ruler as Empress Sadako
(Teishi). However she died after 10 months. 12-year old Akiko
now became Empress.

986, Emperor Karzan abdicated at age 18, and became a Buddhist priest
one year after the death of his wife in childbirth. He was succeeded by his
6-year-old half brother, who ruled until 1011 as Ichijo.

984, Japanese Emperor Enyu abdicated in favour of his
16-year-old son, who ruled until 986 as Karzan.

969, The insane Japanese Emperor Reizei was removed by the Fujiwara family after a reign of nearly
2 years. He was replaced by his 10-year-old brother, who ruled as Emperor Enyu
until 984.

967, Japanese Emperor Murakami died aged 41 after a 21-year
reign. He was succeeded by his 17-year-old son, Emperor Reizei, who ruled until
969 despite his insanity.

946, Japanese Emperor Suzako died after a 16-year reign aged
23. He was succeeded by his 2-year-old brother, Murakami, who ruled until 967.

930, Emperor Diago died aged 45 after a 33-year reign. He was
succeeded by his 7-year-old son, who ruled until 946 as Emperor Suzaku.

897, Japanese Emperor Uda abdicated aged 30 after a 10-year
reign. He was succeeded by his 12-year-old son who ruled until 930 as Emperor Daigo.

887, Japanese Emperor Koko abdicated and died soon after,
aged 57. He was succeeded by his 20-year-old son, who ruled as Emperor Uda
until 897.

884, Iapanese Emperor Yozei, who had devoted his time mainly
to his horses, was forced to abdicate aged 16 after an 8-year reign. He was
succeeded by the 54-year-old half-brother of his grandfather, who ruled until
887 as Emperor
Koko.

876, Emperor Seiwa abdicated, aged 26, and was succeeded by his
mentally and ohysically weak son, 8-year-old Yozei, who ruled until 884.

858, Emperor Montoku died aged 31, and was succeeded by his 8-year-old
son Seiwa,
who ruled until 876.

850, Emperor Ninmio died aged 40. After a succession struggle, he was
succeeded by his 23-year-old son who ruled as Emperor Montoku until 858.

823, Japanese Emperor Saga abdicated, aged 37, after a
14-year reign He was succeeded by his 31-tear-old briother who ruled until 833
as Emperor
Junna.

813, In Japan, Watamaro was appointed Sei-i-Shogun (Barbarian-Subduing-General) for the duration of his
campaign against the Ainu.

809, Emperor Heizei abdicated after a 3-year reign. He was succeeded by
his 23-year-old brother, Saga, who ruled until 823.

806, Emperor Kannu died aged aged 69 after a 24-year reign. He was
succeeded by his 32-year-old son, Heizei, who reigned until 809.

802, The Ainu, inhabitants of
the island of Hokkaido, were conquered by the Japanese under Tamura Maro.
However very few Japanese ever settled in Hokkaido until the 1870s.

794, The capital of Japan was transferred to Heian (now Kyoto), where it
remained until 1868.

781, Emperor Konin died aged 73. He was succeeded by his half-Korean
son, aged 44, who ruled as Emperor Kanmu until 806.

770, Japanese Empress Koken (Shotuku) died aged 52 She was
succeeded by the 62-year-old grandson of the late Tenji, who ruled until 781 as Emperor Konin.

758, The Japanese Empress Koken abdicated after
a 9-year reign. She was succeeded by her 25-year-old cousin Junin, who ruled until 764. However Koken and the Fujiwara family retained power behind the scenes.

2/5/756, Shomu, Emperor of
Japan, died.

749, Japanese Emperor Shomu abdicated, aged 48, after a 25-year
reign. He was succeeded by his 31-year-old daughter Koken, who ruled until
758.

724, Japanese Empress Gensho abdicated and was succeeded by her
23-year-old nephew, Shomu, son of Momu, who ruled until 749.

715, Japanese Empress Gemmei abdicated aged 54 after an 8-year reign
She was succeeded by her 35-year-old daughter who ruled until 724 as Empress Gensho.

712, Japan’s oldest
book, the Kojiki, was completed. It
covered the nation’s history from mythical beginnings to around 600 AD. It
reinforced the imperial family’s claim to be descended from the Shinto Sun
Goddess, Amaterasu. It was the first work written on the Japanese script Kana;
before then only Chinese writing was used in Japan.

710, Nara became the capital of Japan.

707, Japanese Emperor Momu died aged 24 after a 10-year reign and
was succeeded by his 46-year-old aunt who ruled as Empress
Gemmet until 715.

706, The Japanese city
of Nara was founded.

697, Japanese Empress Jito abdicated, aged 32, after an 11-year
reign And was succeeded by the 14-year-old grandson of the late Tenmu. He ruled until 707 as Emperor
Momu.

686, Japanese Emperor Tenmu died after a
14-year reign and was succeeded by his 21-year-old widow and neice. She had her
late husband’s son executed on charges of treason so that her own son by Tenmu could succeed. However he was taken ill and died. His
mother then ruled as Empress Jito until 697.

671, Japanese Emperor Tenji died, aged 45, after a 10-year reign. He
was succeeded by his 23-year-old son Kobun. However Kobun’s mother, the mistress of Tenji, was not of royal
descent and Tenji’s brother, Ooama, objected to his succession. In 672 Kobun was deposed by Ooama, and committed
suicide. Ooama took the throne
as Emperor Tenmnu, and reigned
until 686.

661, Empress Saimei died aged 67; she was succeeded by a son
of the late Emperor Jomei. He ruled intil
671 as Emperor Tenji.

654, Emperor Kotoku died and Empress
Kogyoku, now aged 60, was reinstated, She began a further 7-year reign as Empress Saimei.

645, In the middle of a
severe famine, Japanese Empress Kogyoku was deposed and
the 49-year –old grandson of Bintas was inaugurated
as Emperor Kotoku.

641, The Japanese Emperor Jomei died aged 48 and was succeeded by his
47-year-old widow, who ruled until 645 as Empress
Kogyoku.

628, The Japanese Empress Suiko died aged 74 after a 35-year reign. She
was succeeded by a grandson of her late husband, Bintas, who ruled ass Emperor Jomei until 641.

621, Emperor Shotoko Taishi of Japan died (born 552).
Beginning of the Asuka Period.

592, Emperor Sushun of Japan was assassinated on order of his uncle Umako, who was jealous of his power. Sushun was succeeded by the widow of the
late Emperor Bintas, aged 38; she ruled for 35 years from 593 as Empress Suiko. Under her rule, Buddhism was firmly established
in Japan, which became increasingly Sinoised. In 593, Suiko’s 19-year-old son, Crown Prince Shotoku, was made Prime
Minister; he held power, with strongman Umako, for the next 30 years.

587, The Japanese Emperor Yomei died aged 47.
He was succeeded by the 66-year-old nephew of strongman Iname Soga. Emperor Sushun now ruled until 592. Iname Soga ordered the assassination of the anti-BuddhistMorio Nomomobe The introduction of Buddhism had been opposed by some in Japan
who wanted to preserve the indigenous agrarian-naturist Shinto religion. Shinto adapted to Buddhism by adopting Buddhist counterparts to every kami (diety)
in the Shinto pantheon.

587, The first Buddhist monastery was established
in Japan.

585, Japanese Emperor Bintas died aged 47,
after a 14-year reign, He was succeeded by his 45-year-old brother Yomei, who ruled fro 2 years.

571, The Japanese Emperor Kinmei died aged 62
after a 32-year reign, He was succeeded by 33-year-old son, Bintas, who ruled until 585.

552, Buddhism was introduced to Japan from Korea. It became the State Religion of
Japan 40 years later.

539, The Japanese Emperor Senka died aged 72.
He was succeeded by his 30-year-old half-brother, Kinmei, who ruled until 571.

478, First Shinto
shrines in Japan.

390, Japan
conquered Korea.

200, The Japanese Empress Jingu sent a huge
fleet to invade Korea, which capitulated without a fight at the sight of the
large ships.

8/9/23 BCE. The first recorded ritual Sumo wrestling bout
took place. Each year a priest still officiates for the Ceremony of the Crows
at the Kamo shrine, Kyoto, Japan.

81 BCE, The Japanese Emperor Sujin began a major shipbuilding programme to expand supplies of seafood.